"men are sexualised too" call me when we get dick physics in video games, then we'll talk about male sexualisation.
I have never, and will never, forget the horror of the final boss in Dante's Inferno...
"men are sexualised too" call me when we get dick physics in video games, then we'll talk about male sexualisation.
This is straight up inaccurate. Developers like Idea Factory, Compile Heart, Nippon Ichi, Gust, etc where already releasing games on PS3 before XIII's release. We might not be on the same page here.It wasn't the only cause, but it was definitely a contributing factor. If people were buying PS3 games in high enough numbers to justify the cost of development, the games would've come. But until FFXIII came out PS3 games were generally not doing well enough on their own for developers to deem the platform worth supporting. And after several years of virtually everything on the DS doing at least okay, there was very little motivation to change gears.
As I watched/listened as my GF play through the first game, the use of well worn anime tropes, particularly tied to the harem genre was quite noticeable.People are talking about the latest Trails games but to be honest I think Trails of Cold Steel 1 already crossed the line. Maybe it doesn't get as explicit as ogling mini games but the general attitude of the game is pretty bad, the game is a harem and you can see that attitude constantly woven into the writing and character interactions.
I'm not sure if I see DS & PSP as the start of that. Both of those got quite a lot of JRPGs that sold well enough to not need to dip into the otaku-well too deeply yet. DS & PSP is still time when we got stuff like the initial Kiseki trilogy (not entirely unproblematic, but generally pretty good with depictions of women & non-sexualized children), Tactics Ogre, Jeanne D'Arc, Radiant Historia, TWEWY, all kinds of non-Persona SMT games, Rune Factory, Soma Bringer, Magical Starsign, early Etrian Odysseys etc. that I don't remember being too bad with this stuff.It all happened midway through the PS2 generation. There was a point around 2005-2006 where JRPGs took a HARD shift in the "KIDS ARE AWESOME, ALL ADULTS SUCK" direction for a few years, and then the PS3 crashing into a wall at full speed drove the JRPG genre onto handhelds, where developers were more free to (or in some cases had to) focus on niche demographics due to the lower required sales necessary for a game to be a success.
After two straight generations of the JRPG genre being almost entirely focused around the DS, PSP, 3DS and Vita, the few developers still supporting the genre have gone all in on supporting the obsessive, merch-happy male otaku demographic that supported them during the JRPG Dark Ages and don't care even a little bit about trying to widen their net now that the PS4, Switch and PC userbases are more than happy to buy their games.
The people making the games nowdays are making the kinds of games they want to play, and everyone who wants more mature, thoughtful JRPGs is shit out of luck. It sucks.
True dat, but even problematic series like Game of Thrones didn't go out of their way to, like, sell Sexy Sansa merch or anything like that. That's just a low that seems like quite a few JRPGs reach (or drop to).Even many other TV shows would pale in comparison to I May Destroy You in depicting sexual trauma sensitively. JRPGs gotta be at the bottom!
Enjoy! (or well, it can be kinda hard to watch at times, but it was a good watch!)
I'm not sure if I see DS & PSP as the start of that. Both of those got quite a lot of JRPGs that sold well enough to not need to dip into the otaku-well too deeply yet. DS & PSP is still time when we got stuff like the initial Kiseki trilogy (not entirely unproblematic, but generally pretty good with depictions of women & non-sexualized children), Tactics Ogre, Jeanne D'Arc, Radiant Historia, TWEWY, all kinds of non-Persona SMT games, Rune Factory, Soma Bringer, Magical Starsign, early Etrian Odysseys etc. that I don't remember being too bad with this stuff.
I think Vita was really where it really started going all wrong. It sold ok but not all that great in Japan, basically DOA outside Japan. Consoles were in huge decline. Game sales overall seemed down, unless you were Nintendo/Pokemon/Animal Crossing or Monster Hunter. Nintendo was maybe still seen as the more family friendly option and since there WAS another option in Vita, there went the pedo bait & waifu culture trash and those were nearly all that Vita got. I feel like that brought out all the wrong kind of people into the JRPG fandom who then never left but kept demanding more pedo waifu crap and that really blew up with anything & everything starting to get those elements.
And this:
Yeah, that was a weird addition to the story. When you get down to it, all the top players in Wall Market are culpable for enabling Corneo. Yeah it's a black market and the darkest part of Midgar but they could have handled the whole human trafficking and rape aspect with more gravity. It seems like they were more focused on making the Honeybee Inn less problematic while failing to address the most fucked up section of the Wall Market arc.And also fuck this guy too:
He lost his girlfriend to Corneo and worked for him to get a chance get back at him. But he is part of a group that doomed other women to that same fate of his girlfriend and no one tells him to fuck off after his needless chapter was over?
Yeah, that was a weird addition to the story. When you get down to it, all the top players in Wall Market are culpable for enabling Corneo. Yeah it's a black market and the darkest part of Midgar but they could have handled the whole human trafficking and rape aspect with more gravity. It seems like they were more focused on making the Honeybee Inn less problematic while failing to address the most fucked up section of the Wall Market arc.
I didn't need to see this to know that was the case. Remember people. There's a high chance that the developers like what they put in and an IP like FF doesn't really need to chase otaku-bait money since it will sell. And we are talking about FFVII here.Ah, yeah! That screenshot you've put in spoilers was a barely veiled "choose which girl is your favourite!!!" moment wasn't it?
It seems like they were more focused on making the Honeybee Inn less problematic while failing to address the most fucked up section of the Wall Market arc.
And then you get Sora/Kairi.It feels weird to say that games should give players less control or choices, but it feels like games should maybe stop making every woman in the game a love interest and just focus on fewer more well written love stories.
Man, I dunno about Utawarerumono. My impression of Aquaplus was powering through Tears to Tiara 2 based on praise for the story but a single scene where a female character is bathing and asks the male lead to help (who is characterized as being hyper competent) turns into a stuttery mess that was enough to remind me of the company's H-game origins. 50 hour playthrough and that's what ended up sticking with me. It's kinda unfair since I have positive memories of equally problematic games but it was so out of place.
Tears to Tiara 2 was 2014 though so it has been a while. I'm just not too enthused to give it another chance based on that impression, heh.
Yeah, I enjoyed Clarissa from Wild Arms XF. They very bluntly push her distaste for lying into the story that is reflective of her past and how she makes present day decisions in a way that made it feel like it was designed to be part of the story rather than an afterthought quirk.
... I'm pretty sure the game was shipping her with her adopted brother though which isn't related to the sexism angle but Trails in the Sky got dinged for it so I figured.
Just to keep in the spirit of Final Fantasy, I've been playing FF Type-0 over the past week or so (well, I've had to take a break which is why I'm ranting about it in this thread), and I've been having quite a bit of fun. The story is a load of anime nonsense where it can't decide on whether it wants to be a really dark fantasy thing like Game of Thrones- the game opens with a Chocobo that is bloodied and dying- or a goofy, tropey shonen anime, but the gameplay loop is enjoyable enough now that I've given it a fair chance.
The whole concept of the game is that you play as all 14 members of the most elite class of a military school, so all the characters are school children aged between 16-17. Anyways, this is Class Zero:
Before I go into my issues with the game, which are probably perfectly clear already, I have to give them some credit for the 50/50 male to female ratio in terms of playable characters, and in terms of movesets and playstyles they've not just dumped all the women into more support class roles, even if the single real pure support class is a woman, so you have plenty of cool attackers to choose from no matter who you play.
So the main gameplay loop in terms of combat is something called Breaksight (or Killsight if it'll kill an enemy), which involves dodging out of the way of an enemies attack, then countering during their recovery animation to deal critical if not fatal damage: ranged characters have an easier time doing this due to the fact they don't need to get close, but this is another issue I have which I'll explain in a sec. Dodging is one of the most important things to do in the game, doubly so because it's much faster than your basic run thanks to no sprint button, and you'll spend literally every single fight dodging around like you're playing Dark Souls with infinite stamina, waiting for a Breaksight opportunity, as it's the only real viable way to kill most things.
And therein lies the problem: if you're playing as one of the women, then you're spending basically every other second of the game looking up their skirts, and it's just super off putting for me. I'll be perfectly honest here and say I'm not usually too put off by stuff like this: like I can enjoy the relative campiness of Bayonetta, and if Cammy still has her thong leotard in SF6 I'll just admit that her default look is never gonna change and use an alt costume. However, there's something about this being a story that is trying to be really dark in parts, coupled with the constant view of the underwear of these schoolgirls (plus the fact the English dub makes 4 of them sound about 10 years old), which is honestly putting me off playing the game entirely, and that's never really happened for me before. It's completely unavoidable too unless of course you just decide to not play as the women at all, and some of them just have random flips and even skirts just flicking up after performing basic attacks and special attacks. The best part is that one of the few characters who has a dodge slide opposed to a dodge roll is the woman with the gun, who is one of the few characters who doesn't actually need to use the dodge roll at all really, because you can just stand away from enemies, wait for them to whiff, then shoot them for the Breaksight.
There's thankfully one outlier to the bunch, which is Seven, and she is thankfully wearing shorts under her skirt, which is like a small miracle in the grand scheme of things with this game.
Moving on from that, I'm currently doing a quest which involves trying to determine if the female professor that everyone finds attractive, and who is like the only character so far with boob physics, is actually a spy for the enemy. Which you achieve by giving her gifts that you have placed a spell on which is basically a hidden camera spell, which gains the ability to see through clothes as you go to the -Ra and -Ga versions, to spy on her in her quarters to see if she has a specific tattoo on her.
So yeah, I couldn't tell you what an I'Cie is, or what Tempus Finis means, but if the game quizzes me on underwear colours and patterns at the end I'd pass with flying colours. :/
I have never, and will never, forget the horror of the final boss in Dante's Inferno...
Que?That whole game is a horror. dead women attack you with their vagina
It's really frustrating because all the anime nonsense is super out of place, and it's just souring me on the whole thing completely. I was hoping that some of the alt costumes might've added pants or shorts, but nope. It's like the opening, and presumably the ending too based on what you're saying, is tonally different than everything else, but is much more interesting.I like a lot about Type-0 (the music, the dark vibes, the death = you get forgotten concept, the opening and ending are brilliant) but yeah, in a lot of ways it feels like SE trying to ride the Persona/anime high school wave and copying some of the worst things that entails. And even then it's still one of the tamer examples which is kind of depressing.
While I'd defend Hajime Tabata in some regards (FFXV was kind of a miracle in that it exists at all) it's undeniable the Square Enix games he was involved in were some of the creepiest. Cindy in FFXV, Type-0's seedier elements, and then there's The 3rd Birthday which I'm sure will be discussed in this thread eventually because yeesh.
Crisis Core is the only exception I can think of and that's probably because it has like, two women. Cissnei's great tho.
Just updated with a video if you really want to see.
It's really frustrating because all the anime nonsense is super out of place, and it's just souring me on the whole thing completely. I was hoping that some of the alt costumes might've added pants or shorts, but nope. It's like the opening, and presumably the ending too based on what you're saying, is tonally different than everything else, but is much more interesting.
I ummmmm ........ I'm gonna take your word for it. Thanks though!
Yeah Type-0 thrives at its best when it's delivering really well directed and scored emotional gut-punches. There are several throughout the game.
Then the rest is basically a bunch of extremely weird anime war babies going on adventures and getting into hijinks at high school.
Like, the former is still marred by the most confusing lore this side of Kingdom Hearts, but at least it's captivating in a way. If you cut the school and just made them a special ops unit you'd lose nothing and in fact gain a lot, since a lot of said emotional gut-punches would be even worse if you were given more reason to connect to the party.
I'm not gonna defend the first one or the incredibly goofy raider armours, but I will point out the context of the second outfit. Of the three named female characters in the base game who wear it, two are sex workers in bars and one plays up to a certain stereotype, so the cleavage and exposed thighs make sense.finally playing fallout 3 (lttp i know) and the male vs female armour...........
[picture snip]
if theres one thing you want while fighting for survival in a post-apocalyptic irradiated hellscape its exposed titties, stomach, and thighs. im cold just looking at them
edit: if ur bra isn't made from two strainers welded together i don't even wanna know you!!!!!!!! its called fashion sweatie look it up
at least the dude is also scantily clad i GUESS........
A flesh covered boob plate with golden "straps" covering the nipples. Designer couldn't help themselves, huh?With the exception of her boob plate. I liked Caetuna's design.
There used to be a few women involved in the JRPG scene (for example, Reiko Kodama and Soraya Saga) but they all seemed to drop out around - surprise! - the same time things took a turn for the worse.That's fair. I didn't even play KH3 and still heard how badly she was treated as a character. Maybe the answer is to have more diversity in who gets hired to write these games. Maybe more female voices behind the scenes and game that target a wider audience would help.
Yeah. That one thing. To think that combining one of the tops of the concept below with the dress they ended up using would of made it perfect.A flesh covered boob plate with golden "straps" covering the nipples. Designer couldn't help themselves, huh?
With the exception of her boob plate. I liked Caetuna's design.
Sadly.
That whole game is a horror.Dead women attack you with their vagina
We should, too.We could do a whole thread on how (horror) media demonizes vulvas/vaginas.
That whole game is a horror.Dead women attack you with their vagina
What's super frustrating is that the game itself (originally released in 2007) handles it... actually quite well. It's treated (shockingly) maturely and respectfully, and I gained a lot of respect for the franchise for how they tackled such a difficult and horrific story.That whiplash from having watched I May Destroy You (a show that handles rape victimhood really well, I thought) and then coming in here to see discussion about how JRPGs handle it.
For AGES I thought the Ys VIII box art was nice, with a well designed main heroine. That white bit of cloth making up the front of her outfit was really stylish with the blue!
And then one day I realized it wasn't white material, it was her skin and she was basically naked. You let me down, Ys VIII.
I think that's giving Other M a little too much credit. It deserves to die in obscurity.Other m coming up again because the 10 year anniversary. 10 years removed from maybe the most flagrantly sexist game ever.
Are we talking about JRPGs and harem bullshit? Well, as a person that recently finished FFVIIR:
Fuck all this:
And this:
And also fuck this guy too:
He lost his girlfriend to Corneo and worked for him to get a chance get back at him. But he is part of a group that doomed other women to that same fate of his girlfriend and no one tells him to fuck off after his needless chapter was over?
Game embarrassingly pulls a lot of weight trying to be toadie for the proverbial male gamer. Tifa suffers for it most transparently and they could barely even be bothered to just write Tifa for Tifa.
And it's probably going to stay like this as they seem completely committed in their attempt to please everyone. All coomers welcome.