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Why women criticise sexualised character designs |OT2| I have no pants and I must scream (READ OP)
- Thread starter Persephone
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Anybody fans of Claymore in here? Like no woman gets sexualized in that. Same can mostly be said about Black Lagoon as well. Revy, Roberta and Balalaika are all about that female empowerment...even if they're all massively fucked up.
Well I'm glad we definitely are still talking about that and not yet another fly came into the trap like honey...again...you know at this point we really need to change the flypaper, it's getting nasty.
I'm open to having my mind changed, and I enjoy discussion on this topic. That's why I replied with my opinion in the first place.
I read the original post, I don't think I've been refuted by just that.
I mean, Black Lagoon also has plenty of sexualized women for the background characters, like that pimp scene had a bunch of topless women. Though yeah, it's very good for that...shame the author cannot keep a schedule to save his life.
Also, Claymore is good but personally I really like Angel Densetsu over it.
You "don't think I've been refuted by just that" because you're literally dismissing the experiences of so many people who are just sick and tired of being denigrated in this manner.
You have no empathy and I do not have the capacity to teach you how to empathize. I can only suggest imagining yourself in her shoes for once, but I doubt you're even capable of that much.
Stuff like that makes sense in context and really isn't what the show is about though. Any woman with a name though for the most part takes no shit from anybody unless it's Greenback Jane. Tell me more about Angel Densetsu?
That's... a bit of a stretch and a low blow, especially for this forum.
If I didn't want to empathize, surely I wouldn't post in the first place? I wrote my opinions on the matter and would like to talk about the topic at hand. Three users so far have given unhelpful, condescending replies.
I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do. Being dismissive of others isn't a form of argumentation.
That's literally all you did in your initial... *ahem* "argument".
That made me laugh. Thanks.
Claymore is fantastic through and through, and I wish the anime could have been much longer than it wound up being. Read all of the manga instead and would have loved had it never stopped. My only annoyance was them constantly denying Claire's abilities despite her various feats. That made absolutely no sense to me.
I started Black Lagoon but have yet to continue it... I guess I just have to be in the mood for it. I'll get to that. It's a bit older, but I also absolutely adore Armitage III. Her design is a bit on the skimpy side, but she is such a badass and having a mixed race couple in an anime was and still is super fantastic. Oh, and again I love the setting. Dirty sci-fi was the best.
Claymore is a good example of the difference between showing nudity and sexualizing characters
been meaning to ask for FOREVER... but I'mma need a source for that avatar (or character name?), the art style looks lovely
Angel Densetsu is the prior manga of the guy who made Claymore.
It's...nothing like Claymore. It's a comedy/romance/action manga about a guy whose the sweetest, most friendly pacifist guy on earth that also has a very scary face and "evil aura" so everyone misinterprets what he says as something very evil. So most stories are just him going about his day to day school life while gangs and fighters constantly challenge him and thanks to happenstance and luck he keeps on "winning by knockout" and as such he comes accross as a strong fighter which leads to more people challenging him which the cycle continues. It's amazing how much action you can get when a guy refuses to actually harm someone.
Putting aside the fact that this topic is for discussing female video game characters and not other forms of media, these have all been criticized. Feminists have been critiquing filmmakers for decades around how women are framed by cameras, treated by the writers in terms of plot relevance, and how actresses feel more pressure to lose weight and/or have cosmetic procedures.
If you're being vaguely serious I recommend checking out the threadmark, it answers quite a few of your questions.
Also this might also be useful
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning
I love how it must have taken them a long time to write that troll post only for no one to buy it at all. That loser must have thought he was so clever and in the end all he got was ridicule and a ban. Hilarious.
Black Lagoon definitely requires being in a certain mindset. There is a very specific feeling needed to sit through it.
Anyone seen Angel's Egg? It also requires being in a very specific mindset, in entirely the opposite direction! :P
My avatar is Neferpitou from Hunter x Hunter, I checked Google images and I can't even find the source anymore.
been meaning to ask for FOREVER... but I'mma need a source for that picture (or character name?), the art style looks lovely
It's very hard to sexualize Ophelia...
At some point I'm buying the manga box set. I have the anime on blu ray which was faithful till the last 4 eps or something. I read a good amount passed the anime ending, but never finished. Miria was my favorite. I think they denied Claire's abilities because she honestly was a statistical anomaly, her feats were way greater than what her ranking dictated should be possible. I think they even tried to half ass recreate her and it didn't work. Black Lagoon requires a lot of tolerance for dark nihilism, but it's good, just messed up.
I'll take a crack at this.
So often polarizing images that have been proven to be excludatory in nature when it comes to over the top default objectification are fine..."because girls like guys who like girls?" That's actually done. That's 90's beer bikini model dumb. Allowing bad behavior simply because it's the status quo is how we became numb to school shootings and sexual assaults, and refusing to even discuss the issue is nothing short of foolhardy. Even if you're into the idealized status quo of beauty, that doesn't make our societal reliance on such traditional beauty immune to criticism. And again, keep in mind, these two 60,000 posts threads aren't demanding that these pinup bodied characters go away, they simply bring up when they are silly or repealing. Everyone will have an opinion on them, no one is speaking for other people, that's the crux of this discussion.
We are not coming to take away your titties. We don't have the power to do that.
These forms of media have been criticized since their inception, of course we need to talk about the overbearing objectification of women in other forms of media to. This is not unique to video games by any means. But this is a video game forum so...we talk about video games.
But yes, in the greater discussion of female representation and objectification, other forms of media and artwork are rife with poor behavior, most often drive by the idea that men are so dumb, if you put a product next to an attractive scantly clad woman, they will buy it simply because it was near an attractive, scantly clad woman. Men should feel just as insulted to that 90's style advertising as women do, but the power of boners is strong.
Mike Z and the Skullgirls team also removed quite a few frames depicting the cast in more scandulous positions as well. The art team on Skullgirls made a point that there is a line that's too much for them to cross. And no one is saying that swaying dick physics will solve the problem, it's just a response to the over the top standard of jiggling breast physics that exists in a lot of video games. It really solves nothing and there is an argument to be made about the sexualization and objectification of men in video games.
But this isn't the thread to do that. We've tried making that thread, it didn't go well.
People are allowed to enjoy what they enjoy, sure. If people decide to get really into Princess Crown or Senran Kagura or DOAX, we can't really say "No your bad for liking that". What I, personally, would like though is for those people who like those things to be like, "yes this is the smut I like. These are not reasonable representations of girls and women, these are out their fantasies that don't exist in reality and I should have expectations for women to treat me like these imaginary women do." God knows men sure as hell were saying that when twilight was new. Remember the concept of the dad-bod? A marketing campaign that was championing the slightly too tubby, out of shape body of the common mid 30 year old as a sex symbol? Meanwhile you have media saying if a woman is over 32, she's over the hill. That's the kind of thing we'll shit on all day, and if you're defending that shit with "people can't enjoy X? that's just wrong!", you're an asshole.
I think pride isn't for us. I'd rather let the people who pride belongs to decide those things. As an ally of multiple LGBTQ+, when pride comes around, I stay away and let them do them.
Now count on your fingers how many strong female protagonists you can think of that don't have at least 10 minutes of on screen time devoted purely to their butt. It's hard. Even overwatch, which is a bastion of inclusiveness, works it's sex appeal up to the nines.
If your argument is "I know women who play games and they're fine with it so what are you even talking about?" You should pay more attention. Inclusion comes in many forms, and making every girl in your game basically walk around in a thong and a corset is not the best way to attract female attention. Games in general need to stop being a boys club. THAT'S the problem. You can have attractive characters in any brand of media and still not be demeaning to the sexes. Fuck man, how many games are there that trot their women around in pasties and t-backs, but are SCARED TO DEATH to even think about talking about the act of sex? I'm all for more games talking about actual sex, because it brings up greater conversations about what relationships are, when they're healthy, when they're not, what makes a partner a good fit, when people should go their separate ways.
But video games don't wanna do that. Video games spend all of their time trying to meaninglessly titillate the audience because most developers think you're so dumb that if you see a girl with her tits hanging out, you'll buy the game no questions asked. That's garbage and you shouldn't champion that shit because "people like pretty people."
So often polarizing images that have been proven to be excludatory in nature when it comes to over the top default objectification are fine..."because girls like guys who like girls?" That's actually done. That's 90's beer bikini model dumb. Allowing bad behavior simply because it's the status quo is how we became numb to school shootings and sexual assaults, and refusing to even discuss the issue is nothing short of foolhardy. Even if you're into the idealized status quo of beauty, that doesn't make our societal reliance on such traditional beauty immune to criticism. And again, keep in mind, these two 60,000 posts threads aren't demanding that these pinup bodied characters go away, they simply bring up when they are silly or repealing. Everyone will have an opinion on them, no one is speaking for other people, that's the crux of this discussion.
We are not coming to take away your titties. We don't have the power to do that.
These forms of media have been criticized since their inception, of course we need to talk about the overbearing objectification of women in other forms of media to. This is not unique to video games by any means. But this is a video game forum so...we talk about video games.
But yes, in the greater discussion of female representation and objectification, other forms of media and artwork are rife with poor behavior, most often drive by the idea that men are so dumb, if you put a product next to an attractive scantly clad woman, they will buy it simply because it was near an attractive, scantly clad woman. Men should feel just as insulted to that 90's style advertising as women do, but the power of boners is strong.
Mike Z and the Skullgirls team also removed quite a few frames depicting the cast in more scandulous positions as well. The art team on Skullgirls made a point that there is a line that's too much for them to cross. And no one is saying that swaying dick physics will solve the problem, it's just a response to the over the top standard of jiggling breast physics that exists in a lot of video games. It really solves nothing and there is an argument to be made about the sexualization and objectification of men in video games.
But this isn't the thread to do that. We've tried making that thread, it didn't go well.
People are allowed to enjoy what they enjoy, sure. If people decide to get really into Princess Crown or Senran Kagura or DOAX, we can't really say "No your bad for liking that". What I, personally, would like though is for those people who like those things to be like, "yes this is the smut I like. These are not reasonable representations of girls and women, these are out their fantasies that don't exist in reality and I should have expectations for women to treat me like these imaginary women do." God knows men sure as hell were saying that when twilight was new. Remember the concept of the dad-bod? A marketing campaign that was championing the slightly too tubby, out of shape body of the common mid 30 year old as a sex symbol? Meanwhile you have media saying if a woman is over 32, she's over the hill. That's the kind of thing we'll shit on all day, and if you're defending that shit with "people can't enjoy X? that's just wrong!", you're an asshole.
I think pride isn't for us. I'd rather let the people who pride belongs to decide those things. As an ally of multiple LGBTQ+, when pride comes around, I stay away and let them do them.
Now count on your fingers how many strong female protagonists you can think of that don't have at least 10 minutes of on screen time devoted purely to their butt. It's hard. Even overwatch, which is a bastion of inclusiveness, works it's sex appeal up to the nines.
If your argument is "I know women who play games and they're fine with it so what are you even talking about?" You should pay more attention. Inclusion comes in many forms, and making every girl in your game basically walk around in a thong and a corset is not the best way to attract female attention. Games in general need to stop being a boys club. THAT'S the problem. You can have attractive characters in any brand of media and still not be demeaning to the sexes. Fuck man, how many games are there that trot their women around in pasties and t-backs, but are SCARED TO DEATH to even think about talking about the act of sex? I'm all for more games talking about actual sex, because it brings up greater conversations about what relationships are, when they're healthy, when they're not, what makes a partner a good fit, when people should go their separate ways.
But video games don't wanna do that. Video games spend all of their time trying to meaninglessly titillate the audience because most developers think you're so dumb that if you see a girl with her tits hanging out, you'll buy the game no questions asked. That's garbage and you shouldn't champion that shit because "people like pretty people."
Even though that was way more effort then that dude even deserved, this was a really good post. Thank you for it.
I don't even need to read any of that, I can just look at the Avatar and guess what the content of their post is.
...
Oh silly me, it's actually legit worse than I expected.
You did good.
But unlike you I cant be assed with entertaining them anymore. They're feigning ignorance of a topic widely understood, pretending like they innocently don't get it when they do. His responses are common rethoric. There's no way he's been on the internet for more than a week and hasn't run into that type of discussion before ad nauseum.
Similarly, same goes for the suicide posters that go "what about the violence?" But never, ever once actually create a topic on video game violence.
Them: "What about the violence?!?!"
Also them: "Check out the receipt I got at gamestop for my MK11 preorder!"
Also them: "Why doesn't jade have her titties out anymore?"
::Sigh:: Back to the Cohen testimony for me.
...I haven't been keeping up with that. That sounds like a wild ride...
There probably should be a thread on violence but I think one of the big problems is that it would devolve real quickly with trolls.
Occassionally they come up, threads have been made about things like the torture scene in GTAV, Lara's death scenes in the Tomb Raider Reboot, or Mortal Kombat fatalities being too graphic.
Some of it is cultural, US society has a high tolerance for portrayals of fictional violence in media.
Hey thanks everyone for the anime recommendations. I will definitely give them a try! But to be frank, from what I see I doubt modern anime and me can become good friends. Most of them are too gross :(
At least I still have the older stuff!
At least I still have the older stuff!
That got me good! XD
Also:
As a late bloomer to Era I guess I haven't been around for that one - care to tell me a bit what happened?
Yeah, and at the end of the day this was what the argument boiled down to. Great response.
Boner culture indeed.
It's kinda sad, to be honest. If I see something that's good I'll try to PM you, especially if it's sci-fi, Static_Void
Well, looks like that term is here to stay, huh?
Thanks!
I mean, I can't help but giggle when I hear it. It's just so stupid.
https://www.dailydot.com/parsec/gamergate-boner-culture-mortal-kombat-11/
I mean it's the most pathetic thing to come out of that crowd in 2019 so far so...yep.
A tweet I took from that article. Wow...
This guy cannot be a functioning adult.
Even that's hard sometimes when you got people arguing that women who do that stuff exist. Like that one guy in the DoA thread arguing that there are women who like to fondle each other's breasts. I mean, yeah, there's probably women out there who do that. Just like there's probably women who don't mind have their heads petted like a dog. That doesn't mean it isn't demeaning when an anime depicts men doing that as some cute, affectionate moment.
Bones McSkeleton did not die in the skeleton war to be insulted in such a manner!
This is exactly where I am, sexy things belong in sexy games. The problem is the thin veneer of sex plastered all over 90% of games made. Jiggle physics isnt the problem, every game having it is the problem. Bikini armor isnt the problem, EVERYONE wearing bikini armor in EVERYTHING is the problem. Ideally we would have more DOAs and HuniePops, but at the same time the scales tip and the more standard, mass market games like your Dotas and whathaveyous tone everything down.
Like, Ill happily say "This is the smut I enjoy" but I dont want to have to say it about Xenoblade 2, if that makes sense.
That's extremely fair. I hesitate to say that the majority of games have that sex venier coating it in order to be fair to games that are doing things well...but just like anime has a weird creepy streak running though most of it when it comes to how...women in general are treated, games tend to paint themselves with the same 1 note sexed up brush strokes tends to push people away or make people uncomfortable than doing the opposite.
We talked about this like a month ago but Okami is a game I adore, but man, Sakuya and Rao's designs are embarrassing AF and are kind of a big stain on an otherwise amazing game.
That being said, the spider queen design is Super S class.
That's true. People need to get it out of their heads that just because they know someone who likes something doesn't mean all people like it. The transitive property does not work on an emotional level.
Black Lagoon is a great example of framing, male gaze, and all that good stuff. Revy is running around in a tank top and daisy dukes, but never feels like she's just eye candy. Even Shenhua, giving all the leg she has to give, keeps it tasteful. And Balalaika and Roberta are just badasses. Even Dutch is a rarity in anime. He's a black American with a good design, who's a shrewd, level headed leader. He's still super cool despite not being at the center of the action.
Oh no, I wasnt suggesting that. Absolutely rip off that veneer of sex for most games, bundle it all up and stick it where it belongs, with the stuff thats already sexy. Thats what I was getting at with Xenoblade 2, its a wonderful game but the character designs put you on a backfoot already when talking about it. Thats what I meant by "I dont want to have to say this is the smut I enjoy", id rather the character designs be changed since theyre really not in line with everything else about it. The way it is now though, you either have to not play the game out of principle, ignore it and make no excuses because you dont spend your life arguing on message boards (not an option for me), call it the smut you enjoy, or make excuses for it.
Dutch also knows when he's outmatched. That man never wants to be within a 50 mile radius of Balalaika and Roberta. Shenhua is great, tons of leg, but never sexualized., same with Eda. Black Lagoon smartly plays with tropes and doesn't use them for exploitative reasons.
An even bigger problem on top of everything being "sexy" is when the shoehorned in sexy female character(s) have less personality and character than the blow up doll collectables in Saints Row 4.
It's going to need a really good OP as well to help keep away the usual arguments.
Witch Hunter Robin's a really cool action show from the same era.
Also, if you haven't already, check out the dub of Land of the Lustrous.
edit: I feel like when I'm in this thread the discussion almost always ends up, "wow, remember when anime wasn't a complete and utter fucking shit show? Remember when video games from Japan weren't a complete and utter fucking shit show? Those were the days."
I can't tell if this is just pessimism, nostalgia, regression, or simply hyperawareness of media due to the internet, but whatever it is things have definitely changed and it really doesn't feel like things are moving the right direction. =/
Interestingly, a Pew Research article actually reinforces this, at least as general Japanese views on the current state of things, even as confidence in their economy is increasing: http://www.pewglobal.org/2018/11/12...nd-them-and-say-children-face-a-bleak-future/
I haven't watched Witch hunter robin in years, but I remember really liking the show. Might need to do a rewatch soon 🤔
Ultimately this is the issue. Men get cool armor, women get bikinis. And yes, in-game we're at war, but for some reason, equally protective. What makes it even more stark is when some women are dressed practically and others are dressed in ridiculous clothes, and in some cases it gets even worse when it becomes part of the discourse (XC2, ironically enough, is actually a good example of this).
A few things:
1) Nobody wears heels to a gun fight. Or any fight.
2) Armor is made to protect, which means if you're wearing armor, it COVERS YOUR ENTIRE FUCKING BODY. Otherwise, you're not wearing armor. You're wearing clothes. Or rags. Or bikinis. The last two are probably the same to most character designers.
3) No armor is skin-tight. It does not exist, stop it with that shit, people gotta breathe.
4) People have spines. They cannot bend that way.
5) I shouldn't have to tell you this, because you should understand basic cinematography, but stop with the slow-motion and panning shots of every woman's tits and ass. It's creepy.
It makes total sense. I agree with your post 100%.
There is space for sexy games with sexy character designs. The problem is everyone doing it.
I've said it before on this thread: I generally love the look of the much maligned zettai ryouiki on real life and fictional depictions of anime women, I think it can be cute, incredibly sexy and/or elegant depending on the execution. My problem with this thigh gap thing is the absolute obsession character designers in anime and videogames have with it (Japan being the culprit of 99% of this).
It's like almost every fucking piece of fictional media depicted in an anime style that comes from Japan has at least one girl in one variation of zettai ryouiki. It bothers me that it's EVERYWHERE!!! EVERY FUCKING WHERE! It has become a crutch and synonym with me of a developer who gave up and designed this girl without thinking about it to meet a deadline or because the creativity is gone or was never there.
Oh and if the game/anime is set on a high school? You're 95% assured you'll get a collection of girls in school uniforms with micro skirts who's only visual identifier is their hair, the size of their tits (who's personalities are oftentimes linked to their breast size accordingly to the tropes we all know) and the length of their thigh gap (because you'll get it in many flavor: above the knee, middle thigh, white, black, below the knee, thigh gap for every taste!). Other than that they have the exact same face and body type.
Oh except for the token loli. Gotta have the 12 year old girl that's shorter than the rest and flat as a board who's super envious of the girl with the bigger breasts, but I digress.
TL;DR zettai ryouiki is great! But too much of a great thing makes it bad and I hate that it's EVERYWHERE!!!!! And it's been that way since the turn of the century with no sign of going away anytime soon.
Because even in war anime girls need micro skirts and leg wear than leave the thighs exposed.
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I know For Honor's an old example, but, hey, it's nice to just admire the good things in life every once in awhile, y'know?
Admittedly, at this point I'm pretty much just playing the game to admire the pretty visuals. Which, I think, goes a long way to showing that getting people invested in your characters doesn't require you to blatantly pander to the audience in an insultingly base fashion. Just a thought.
Shoutout to the Witch Hunter Robin love in this thread! I loved that anime.
I remember thinking the ending was really good at the time... probably 'cause I was so young, but it felt deep.
Also, I don't think I've mentioned this before but I've loved reading y'all's thoughts in this OT. It's really refreshing to see such a relentless discourse on design stuff even in the face of a seemingly endless domino of trolls and alts.
I remember thinking the ending was really good at the time... probably 'cause I was so young, but it felt deep.
Also, I don't think I've mentioned this before but I've loved reading y'all's thoughts in this OT. It's really refreshing to see such a relentless discourse on design stuff even in the face of a seemingly endless domino of trolls and alts.
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