The Witcher games have some of those.
Basically the whole Blood & Wine expansion is full of those designs
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Why women criticise sexualised character designs | OT3 | "make her look more...corpulent, more stuffed where the eyes can't escape."
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Basically the whole Blood & Wine expansion is full of those designs
Actually I meant to say "in comparison to American developers whenever they do western fantasy." The Witcher games, especially 2 and 3, have a look that at least to me seems more authentically medieval. You almost never see character designs like what's posted above in a western fantasy-themed game from an American or Japanese developer. I imagine one thing that sets Witcher apart is it isn't going through D&D or Tolkien for its inspirations.
That's because most of the time it's you usually don't deal with kings queens and royalty in those games you don't deal with the mobility but commoners which aren't nearly as flamboyant
Egregious as some of these games may be, can we maybe tag spoilers? Some of us will want to play them anyway.
I love every design in the Mask duology
Except for Nosuri.
Anyway, Uta has the best written female characters in games period in my opinion. Which makes designs like Nosuri's stick out like a sore thumb.
I've been dipping my toes into the Visual Novel waters with Utawarerumono: Mask Of Deception and Mask Of Truth, and it's interesting.
They're both sequels to the original Utawa from 2002, which was a hentai VN with SRPG combat interspersed throughout (rereleases, ports and the remake from a few years ago removed all the porn), but it still had some gorgeous character designs (very Ainu inspired), with a few eye-rolly ones. I haven't played in like 15 years but I remember the h-scenes not really adding anything and were probably added just to make it sell. Anway, for those who don't know, they're games where technologically advanced mainline humanity has died out and is survived by humanoids with slight animal features who have built up their own feudal-era Japan styled society, and then the wars and battles for territory and such that transpire around the amnesiac main characters Hakuowro (original game) and Haku (Mask games). Lots of Ainu (as in the indigenous Japanese people) inspired themes/designs.
I just finished MoD and am working on MoT, and I'm quite surprised by the disparity between the good female designs and the worse ones. MoD/T are still kinda horny games despite not being hentai, with the horniness being pretty few and far between, in the 15 hours I've played of Truth there's only been one egregious scene, but I guess its pedigree can't help itself with some of the designs.
For the good, we've got Kuon, who just looks amazing to me. She has long, warm looking robes that are completely sensible and look like something a real person could wear in a colder climate. Other characters like Rulutieh, Nekone, Anju are all wearing these beautiful elaborate robes as well, with intricate designs and great colors.
Then there's characters like Nosuri, who is wearing a leotard with boob socks, or Fumirul who I can't really describe what she's wearing but it's real dumb, then there's characters like Atuy that toe the line between ok and bad design-wise. Really bad ones are the twins who dress like half-naked dancer types, not good.
Kuon looks great though!
Nosuri not so much
The openings for the Mask games are pretty gorgeous tho.
I love every design in the Mask duology
Except for Nosuri.
Anyway, Uta has the best written female characters in games period in my opinion. Which makes designs like Nosuri's stick out like a sore thumb.
A quick throwback to this classic from One Angry gamer
Their article about "benelovent sexism" was beyond embarrassing too.
Their article about "benelovent sexism" was beyond embarrassing too.
A quick throwback to this classic from One Angry gamer
Their article about "benelovent sexism" was beyond embarrassing too.
Hello, I'm new here, but I've been lurking for the better part of... Maybe 15 years before I was able to secure a proper email address to sign up here?
I wonder if there's anyone else here that tends to approach games with custom characters in a similar way that I do. I am generally a more narrative/mechanics focused person when it comes to feedback. For the better part of the past decade, I've somehow gravitated towards roleplaying as a male character instead of female despite being a woman myself. I'm not entirely sure why, I guess it started when I began playing this MMO called Dragon Nest that had gender locked classes (the Priest class, the game's primary healer, was actually male-only). The name and class choice for the character I made in that game was a reference to Megaman Battle Network, not too far removed from people naming themselves Naruto in an online game or something. But over time, I guess it evolved into a sort of online persona that I've carried over into every other game and online community since.
I've since tried to rationalize my tendency to play male characters as trying to experience games from the standpoint of the original developer's intent in this male-dominated industry, or something like that. But in the process of typing out this post, I've come to realize that it's a flimsy excuse at best, ha. Although, playing a male character in most games with any kind of online interactivity may have helped me avoid a lot of potentially unpleasant situations. It sucks that this is the way it is, though.
I think the only recent game I've played so far that didn't fit into this pattern was AC Odyssey, if only because I had heard of how phenomenal Kassandra is as a lead character. People really weren't kidding there, A+ design and characterization.
---
On a different note, I've been getting into cRPGs lately. Specifically the Pathfinder series. I happen to be beta testing Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous at that, and I'm in love with the art direction and writing. My avatar itself is (a badly cropped version of) one of the female portraits you can choose for your player character.
I believe I've seen posts in this thread a few months ago bringing the Pathfinder games up before, but I also want to mention how consistent the style and writing is. It's probably the most fascinating setting I've come across in a while, even if it looks like a standard fantasy thing on a surface level. But there's some real depth to the writing and characterization.
For example, these are the female party members in Wrath of the Righteous.
Contrast with the male companions below.
Notice something? The artists don't really appear to frame the characters any differently based on their gender at all. The actual writing appears to follow the same principle, until it might become briefly relevant for backstory reasons (especially when it comes to Arueshalae for very obvious reasons), but this post is already pretty long-winded as is. If anyone's interested, I could describe a party member's character arcs later upon request, though I probably won't go too deep because Wrath of the Righteous is a yet unreleased game that's currently set to release in a couple of months.
The cast of characters is excellent though. Probably the best written and most diverse set of party members I've seen among every game I've played thus far.
I wonder if there's anyone else here that tends to approach games with custom characters in a similar way that I do. I am generally a more narrative/mechanics focused person when it comes to feedback. For the better part of the past decade, I've somehow gravitated towards roleplaying as a male character instead of female despite being a woman myself. I'm not entirely sure why, I guess it started when I began playing this MMO called Dragon Nest that had gender locked classes (the Priest class, the game's primary healer, was actually male-only). The name and class choice for the character I made in that game was a reference to Megaman Battle Network, not too far removed from people naming themselves Naruto in an online game or something. But over time, I guess it evolved into a sort of online persona that I've carried over into every other game and online community since.
I've since tried to rationalize my tendency to play male characters as trying to experience games from the standpoint of the original developer's intent in this male-dominated industry, or something like that. But in the process of typing out this post, I've come to realize that it's a flimsy excuse at best, ha. Although, playing a male character in most games with any kind of online interactivity may have helped me avoid a lot of potentially unpleasant situations. It sucks that this is the way it is, though.
I think the only recent game I've played so far that didn't fit into this pattern was AC Odyssey, if only because I had heard of how phenomenal Kassandra is as a lead character. People really weren't kidding there, A+ design and characterization.
---
On a different note, I've been getting into cRPGs lately. Specifically the Pathfinder series. I happen to be beta testing Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous at that, and I'm in love with the art direction and writing. My avatar itself is (a badly cropped version of) one of the female portraits you can choose for your player character.
I believe I've seen posts in this thread a few months ago bringing the Pathfinder games up before, but I also want to mention how consistent the style and writing is. It's probably the most fascinating setting I've come across in a while, even if it looks like a standard fantasy thing on a surface level. But there's some real depth to the writing and characterization.
For example, these are the female party members in Wrath of the Righteous.
Seelah the Paladin. Your main tank for most of the game. Later on, she gets the option to have a sort of tiger that she can literally ride on into battle. We are unsure if it's supposed to be a tiger or a more traditional horse since it is beta testing, after all. It is incredibly amusing and terrifying at the same time.
Camellia the Druid. She is, surprisingly enough, a great off-tank due to her high DEX score and her proficiency with using bucklers. She can be built to heal and buff/debuff too since again, she's a Druid, but the tanking part seems to be what most people focus on in regards to building her during beta testing so far. It's actually pretty interesting how the earliest female companions you get in both Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous are actually front-line fighters and more specifically your primary tanks.
Ember the Witch. I have quite a few things to say about how she is written, very good things. Otherwise, she's generally a support mage with a focus on fire spells for direct offense.
Arueshalae, a Ranger succubus trying to find redemption. One of the central romance options for the game because it's obvious why. I may elaborate later if anyone's interested enough to ask.
Nenio, a Kitsune Wizard. She actually starts the game with a human appearance. Exactly what causes her appearance to change is something best not spoiled.
Not pictured: One additional female companion, Wenduag, a Fighter Archer. I can't get her portrait because I don't have her in my party in any of my current save files.
Camellia the Druid. She is, surprisingly enough, a great off-tank due to her high DEX score and her proficiency with using bucklers. She can be built to heal and buff/debuff too since again, she's a Druid, but the tanking part seems to be what most people focus on in regards to building her during beta testing so far. It's actually pretty interesting how the earliest female companions you get in both Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous are actually front-line fighters and more specifically your primary tanks.
Ember the Witch. I have quite a few things to say about how she is written, very good things. Otherwise, she's generally a support mage with a focus on fire spells for direct offense.
Arueshalae, a Ranger succubus trying to find redemption. One of the central romance options for the game because it's obvious why. I may elaborate later if anyone's interested enough to ask.
Nenio, a Kitsune Wizard. She actually starts the game with a human appearance. Exactly what causes her appearance to change is something best not spoiled.
Not pictured: One additional female companion, Wenduag, a Fighter Archer. I can't get her portrait because I don't have her in my party in any of my current save files.
Contrast with the male companions below.
Lann the monk (Zen Archer). He has a super novel build, a TANK ARCHER. Though this doesn't become that obvious until later in the game.
Woljif, a Rogue (specifically Eldritch Scoundrel, a variant capable of casting arcane spells). Super fun guy.
Daeran, an Oracle. Neutral Evil asshole, but probably one of the most well written evil aligned characters I've ever seen thus far, to the point where you can easily justify his presence in a good aligned party without having to come up with any flimsy excuses. He's actually the game's primary healer, though Camellia and Ember can potentially be built for that role too (and it's worth bringing up that Kingmaker's primary healers were also male).
Sosiel the Cleric. He's the other primary healer for the game, though he can hold his own on the front lines while Daeran should be kept in the back.
Regill the Hellknight. He is actually a gnome, and an utterly terrifying one he is.
Greybor the Assassin. Probably the most 'normal' character out of the cast in terms of actually having his life in order, really.
Woljif, a Rogue (specifically Eldritch Scoundrel, a variant capable of casting arcane spells). Super fun guy.
Daeran, an Oracle. Neutral Evil asshole, but probably one of the most well written evil aligned characters I've ever seen thus far, to the point where you can easily justify his presence in a good aligned party without having to come up with any flimsy excuses. He's actually the game's primary healer, though Camellia and Ember can potentially be built for that role too (and it's worth bringing up that Kingmaker's primary healers were also male).
Sosiel the Cleric. He's the other primary healer for the game, though he can hold his own on the front lines while Daeran should be kept in the back.
Regill the Hellknight. He is actually a gnome, and an utterly terrifying one he is.
Greybor the Assassin. Probably the most 'normal' character out of the cast in terms of actually having his life in order, really.
Notice something? The artists don't really appear to frame the characters any differently based on their gender at all. The actual writing appears to follow the same principle, until it might become briefly relevant for backstory reasons (especially when it comes to Arueshalae for very obvious reasons), but this post is already pretty long-winded as is. If anyone's interested, I could describe a party member's character arcs later upon request, though I probably won't go too deep because Wrath of the Righteous is a yet unreleased game that's currently set to release in a couple of months.
The cast of characters is excellent though. Probably the best written and most diverse set of party members I've seen among every game I've played thus far.
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Sounds really interesting, thanks for all that info on Pathfinder. Although I wouldn't be surprised if there's no sexual diversity, they didn't mention any LGBT+ inclusion in their romance Kickstarter stretch goals. I am aware this is one of the games Chris Avellone contributed a lot to and Owlcat Studios hasn't stopped working with him after the sexual misconduct allegations came out because they don't want to "rush" decisions based on allegations...Hello, I'm new here, but I've been lurking for the better part of... Maybe 15 years before I was able to secure a proper email address to sign up here?
I wonder if there's anyone else here that tends to approach games with custom characters in a similar way that I do. I am generally a more narrative/mechanics focused person when it comes to feedback. For the better part of the past decade, I've somehow gravitated towards roleplaying as a male character instead of female despite being a woman myself. I'm not entirely sure why, I guess it started when I began playing this MMO called Dragon Nest that had gender locked classes (the Priest class, the game's primary healer, was actually male-only). The name and class choice for the character I made in that game was a reference to Megaman Battle Network, not too far removed from people naming themselves Naruto in an online game or something. But over time, I guess it evolved into a sort of online persona that I've carried over into every other game and online community since.
I've since tried to rationalize my tendency to play male characters as trying to experience games from the standpoint of the original developer's intent in this male-dominated industry, or something like that. But in the process of typing out this post, I've come to realize that it's a flimsy excuse at best, ha. Although, playing a male character in most games with any kind of online interactivity may have helped me avoid a lot of potentially unpleasant situations. It sucks that this is the way it is, though.
I think the only recent game I've played so far that didn't fit into this pattern was AC Odyssey, if only because I had heard of how phenomenal Kassandra is as a lead character. People really weren't kidding there, A+ design and characterization.
---
On a different note, I've been getting into cRPGs lately. Specifically the Pathfinder series. I happen to be beta testing Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous at that, and I'm in love with the art direction and writing. My avatar itself is (a badly cropped version of) one of the female portraits you can choose for your player character.
I believe I've seen posts in this thread a few months ago bringing the Pathfinder games up before, but I also want to mention how consistent the style and writing is. It's probably the most fascinating setting I've come across in a while, even if it looks like a standard fantasy thing on a surface level. But there's some real depth to the writing and characterization.
For example, these are the female party members in Wrath of the Righteous.
Seelah the Paladin. Your main tank for most of the game. Later on, she gets the option to have a sort of tiger that she can literally ride on into battle. We are unsure if it's supposed to be a tiger or a more traditional horse since it is beta testing, after all. It is incredibly amusing and terrifying at the same time.
Camellia the Druid. She is, surprisingly enough, a great off-tank due to her high DEX score and her proficiency with using bucklers. She can be built to heal and buff/debuff too since again, she's a Druid, but the tanking part seems to be what most people focus on in regards to building her during beta testing so far. It's actually pretty interesting how the earliest female companions you get in both Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous are actually front-line fighters and more specifically your primary tanks.
Ember the Witch. I have quite a few things to say about how she is written, very good things. Otherwise, she's generally a support mage with a focus on fire spells for direct offense.
Arueshalae, a Ranger succubus trying to find redemption. One of the central romance options for the game because it's obvious why. I may elaborate later if anyone's interested enough to ask.
Nenio, a Kitsune Wizard. She actually starts the game with a human appearance. Exactly what causes her appearance to change is something best not spoiled.
Not pictured: One additional female companion, Wenduag, a Fighter Archer. I can't get her portrait because I don't have her in my party in any of my current save files.
Contrast with the male companions below.
Lann the monk (Zen Archer). He has a super novel build, a TANK ARCHER. Though this doesn't become that obvious until later in the game.
Woljif, a Rogue (specifically Eldritch Scoundrel, a variant capable of casting arcane spells). Super fun guy.
Daeran, an Oracle. Neutral Evil asshole, but probably one of the most well written evil aligned characters I've ever seen thus far, to the point where you can easily justify his presence in a good aligned party without having to come up with any flimsy excuses. He's actually the game's primary healer, though Camellia and Ember can potentially be built for that role too (and it's worth bringing up that Kingmaker's primary healers were also male).
Sosiel the Cleric. He's the other primary healer for the game, though he can hold his own on the front lines while Daeran should be kept in the back.
Regill the Hellknight. He is actually a gnome, and an utterly terrifying one he is.
Greybor the Assassin. Probably the most 'normal' character out of the cast in terms of actually having his life in order, really.
Notice something? The artists don't really appear to frame the characters any differently based on their gender at all. The actual writing appears to follow the same principle, until it might become briefly relevant for backstory reasons (especially when it comes to Arueshalae for very obvious reasons), but this post is already pretty long-winded as is. If anyone's interested, I could describe a party member's character arcs later upon request, though I probably won't go too deep because Wrath of the Righteous is a yet unreleased game that's currently set to release in a couple of months.
The cast of characters is excellent though. Probably the best written and most diverse set of party members I've seen among every game I've played thus far.
"As many of our friends and colleagues from the industry, we are shocked by the allegations about Chris Avellone. Chris has contributed a lot to the RPG genre in his career, including our first game Pathfinder: Kingmaker, and his reputation never allowed us to expect any of this ever to happen. We at Owlcat do not condone sexual misconduct in any form. At the same time, we don't uphold taking rushed actions based on allegations, and we will continue monitoring the situation closely to make an informed decision."
Chris has since decided to take his victims to legal action with a SLAPP lawsuit (thread). Hope the game weathers that storm to make for an inclusive experience.
Pathfinder as a whole(not just this particular game) is above average, but not beyond reproach. Within the larger Pathfinder world, they have several needlessly sexualized female characters. These are among their iconic characters. Like Drizzt or Wulfgar or Elminster would be for DnD.
Alahazra
She's a mage/oracle/priestess style character. I think we can all see the problems here. It does remind me of something I'm not sure was mentioned, though. I think Pathfinder does a great job with racial and regional diversity. Lots of brown-skinned people, and not everything has that classic european medieval look.
Amiri
A barbarian, basically. She's more clothed than a male barbarian probably would be. I actually really like her character, but she still has a needless amount of skin exposed.
Feiya
Another spellcaster type. Thigh highs, boobs, and a corset-looking thing? Not great.
Imrijka
Half Orc Inquisitor. Pretty cool design, just a minor issue with boob-plate there.
Kyra
A cleric. I don't have anything bad to say here. I straight up love this character design.
Lini
Gnome Druid. Another good design.
Merisiel
Elf Rogue. Another good design. Some minor cleavage/boob window, but still seems organic rather than forced for the sex appeal.
Seelah
A paladin. Some boob plate, but not egregious. I actually don't like this design because of all the extraneous ornamentation that seems like it would get caught on everything constantly. See the elbow, knee, and shoulder joints.
Seoni
A sorcerer. Seeing a trend where the women spellcasters aren't allowed to wear much clothing, which is unfortunate. To put it in perspective, here's a male wizard, Ezren.
I have a lot of respect for the representation Pathfinder brings, and it's warrior women are top notch. Just wish the spellcasting women were allowed more clothing.
Edit: I just found a crapton more of their iconic characters, and it's still a lot more good than bad. Here's the link:
Alahazra
She's a mage/oracle/priestess style character. I think we can all see the problems here. It does remind me of something I'm not sure was mentioned, though. I think Pathfinder does a great job with racial and regional diversity. Lots of brown-skinned people, and not everything has that classic european medieval look.
Amiri
A barbarian, basically. She's more clothed than a male barbarian probably would be. I actually really like her character, but she still has a needless amount of skin exposed.
Feiya
Another spellcaster type. Thigh highs, boobs, and a corset-looking thing? Not great.
Imrijka
Half Orc Inquisitor. Pretty cool design, just a minor issue with boob-plate there.
Kyra
A cleric. I don't have anything bad to say here. I straight up love this character design.
Lini
Gnome Druid. Another good design.
Merisiel
Elf Rogue. Another good design. Some minor cleavage/boob window, but still seems organic rather than forced for the sex appeal.
Seelah
A paladin. Some boob plate, but not egregious. I actually don't like this design because of all the extraneous ornamentation that seems like it would get caught on everything constantly. See the elbow, knee, and shoulder joints.
Seoni
A sorcerer. Seeing a trend where the women spellcasters aren't allowed to wear much clothing, which is unfortunate. To put it in perspective, here's a male wizard, Ezren.
I have a lot of respect for the representation Pathfinder brings, and it's warrior women are top notch. Just wish the spellcasting women were allowed more clothing.
Edit: I just found a crapton more of their iconic characters, and it's still a lot more good than bad. Here's the link:
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Long time reader, first time poster in here, but since this is a topic I know a bit about, Godfather some of those artworks are from the original release of Pathfinder in 2009. When Pathfinder 2E released in 2019 they updated the iconic designs for those core classes and I think covered a lot of those issues! So yay for progress.
Full gallery of all eight comparisons here: https://imgur.com/gallery/mD6GOiF, but to post the most relevant ones:
Less boob plate on Paladin:
Made the rogue more lithe and got rid of the cleavage:
Much more covering for the sorceress:
Full gallery of all eight comparisons here: https://imgur.com/gallery/mD6GOiF, but to post the most relevant ones:
Less boob plate on Paladin:
Made the rogue more lithe and got rid of the cleavage:
Much more covering for the sorceress:
Long time reader, first time poster in here, but since this is a topic I know a bit about, Godfather some of those artworks are from the original release of Pathfinder in 2009. When Pathfinder 2E released in 2019 they updated the iconic designs for those core classes and I think covered a lot of those issues! So yay for progress.
Full gallery of all eight comparisons here: https://imgur.com/gallery/mD6GOiF, but to post the most relevant ones:
Less boob plate on Paladin:
Made the rogue more lithe and got rid of the cleavage:
Much more covering for the sorceress:
That's funny, cause the Seoni one specifically, I was thinking "I don't remember her showing this much skin". Good to see progress for sure, and thanks for the correction/update!
p.s. this is Palmer from the mafia community. Not sure if you know I changed my name when we switched to resetera.
I've never played the Tabletop RPG or CRPG Pathfinders, but I enjoy the Pathfinder Adventures board games, which is where most of my familiarity with these characters comes from.
Edit: Looking again, it seems like they lightened the skin tones on all of them, which is odd.
Double Edit:
It appears so: https://www.waynereynolds.com/character-art
Triple edit:
He does a proper female ninja too!
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I also always make a male character in character creators. And it's always as androgynous a male character as I can possibly make using the game's creator. I'm also a bit like you in that I often create a similar-looking character with the same name, like a sort of persona across different games. I never really thought about it too much (though I did sometimes wonder if my sisters found it weird, because they always made female characters and I always made male characters), until the period of time when I started to slowly realize things about myself, and then suddenly I was like "oh," lol.
Kingmaker, the previous pathfinder CRPG game, even did what they could with Amiri's design.
Amiri Original
Amiri Kingmaker
The core design I still don't like, but in Kingmaker they went out of their way to bulk her up make her look like a woman actually capable of wielding that giant sword. It is an improvement.
Amiri Original
Amiri Kingmaker
The core design I still don't like, but in Kingmaker they went out of their way to bulk her up make her look like a woman actually capable of wielding that giant sword. It is an improvement.
A lot of the 2e designs have lighter skin tone yeah, which is a bit unfortunate. Here's Amiri one more time for 2e
I mentioned this the last time the Pathfinder designs were brought up, but: the one thing I don't like about the PF2e redesigns is how Amiri looks emaciated compared to her original design and especially compared to the Kingmaker design.
It's not just that, but the paleness and sunken eyes. I get that she's a barbarian so they're giving her this sort of crazed look, but she just looks kind of ill. Otherwise, the new designs (and the entirely new iconics for some of the non-core-rulebook classes) are overall great.
RE: Tabletop designs
I haven't actually seen the tabletop designs from Paizo for myself, but it does look like they've improved over time, so I'm not really going to dwell on those. The cRPGs are handled by another company, Owlcat, who seems to use their own style, and pretty much all of them are universally good.
I have more female portrait designs that you can choose for your character across Wrath of the Righteous and Kingmaker. The below aren't all of them, but they are the majority and I picked the ones I liked the most. Which should say quite a bit if they're the majority of them.
So, I should probably mention something about the romances. There is an LGBT+ romance.
This is the current romance list and this late into the game's development, I don't believe any more will be added.
Romances exclusively available to male characters:
- Camellia
- Wenduag
- Sosiel
Romances exclusively available to female characters:
- Lann
- Daeran
Romances available to both:
- Arueshalae
- Queen Galfrey (one of the major supporting characters in the game, I may be wrong about this and she might be a male-exclusive romance.)
There's a reason I mentioned the writing of the Pathfinder games. It's quite possibly the most inclusive setting I've ever seen. It's largely escaped the notice of the usual drama because the writing presents a lot of the themes of diversity as already normalized in the setting. Like Sosiel only has a preference for male characters, but it's treated as a character trait and not his only reason for being. The writers don't go out of their way to point it out at every possible opportunity, and his character arc doesn't revolve around it.
Two of the supporting cast in Wrath of the Righteous are a married LGBT couple, an orc woman and a human woman, and those two are part of your inner circle of advisors for the crusade throughout the game. You don't actually learn this until the start of the second chapter at the very earliest, and they don't tell you until you do a combination of probably asking too many questions, and them trusting you for safely reuniting them and everything you pulled off in the previous chapter. And I basically read this as them hiding this not because of any fear of persecution, and more that it's not most people's business to know when the group's waging a war against demons hell bent on ending the world as they know it.
Actually, upon further thought, pretty much all of the crusade leadership that you interact with are women. The game doesn't beat you over the head with this fact by calling out their genders, and the one party member who probably has the harshest words to say about the (lack of) progress they've made on resolving the situation (Regill as the leader of his regiment of Hellknights) never uses this angle to criticize them. A Hellknight only focused on practical results would never argue in such a way, really.
As for Avellone? No one's actually sure exactly what he contributed to in Wrath of the Righteous. Someone asked a week ago on the Steam forums and this was the official response.
"Hi!
Chris helped us with the feedback on the game's story and narrative and also conceptualized one companion."
I assumed that party member was Ember, but I've since heard that it wasn't. None of the other party members match his preferred style of writing and characterization that I'm generally aware of either.
I believe for Kingmaker, he wrote the party member Nok-Nok (a highly intelligent goblin among his people, you initially find him being threatened by another faction of goblins in a power struggle for claiming to be a favored priest of their worshipped god, and having thoughts about coexisting with your barony instead of marching to war like the rest).
Nok-Nok was actually a really fun character compared to the moody characters he tended to write in the other games he has been known to contribute (the only other ones I'm really aware of being Pillars of Eternity with Durance and Grieving Mother, and Divinity Original Sin 2 with Fane).
I personally loved Kingmaker, since it had a really atypical plot structure with a story that took place over roughly 3-4 in-game years. But the whole kingdom management stuff is hit or miss among the community. It appears to be a beloved game in the cRPG scene nowadays, but I would describe it as a love-hate relationship. Which is fine for a very ambitious first project. It's probably worth a playthrough purely for how unique it is, if you have 100+ hours to spare. It's a big game.
The writing of the party members in both games are incredible, in my opinion. At first glance they might be kind of tropey, but they actually have a lot of depth to them. And the core of both games really revolves around you and your party members' actions, the writers do a really great job at making the party feel like a family that actually cares about each other.
Like one of the first party members you meet in Kingmaker is a dwarf named Harrim who worships a god named Groteus, with a belief about how everything turns to dust in the end. You might think he's a defeatist, but he's actually not, despite what he may say when he's in the party. Make him the lead religious advisor for your barony/kingdom, and when he comes to you with information about a problem and what he suggests to resolve it, it turns out that he has a very unique angle. He generally respects other people's right to believe whatever they want to and doesn't really try to push his faith on anyone else, so his advice has this general vibe of 'everything comes to an end eventually, so you might as well make the people as happy as you can in a way that reminds them that this happiness is fleeting'.
That's not to say the writers aren't beyond reproach. I have... Things to say about Camellia, but again, Wrath of the Righteous is an unreleased game and it's best I wait until it's been out for a while before I really talk about her. But even then, I realize my negative views about her revolve around her as a character and not about how she's written, even if some of it might be problematic in the context of this thread.
I haven't actually seen the tabletop designs from Paizo for myself, but it does look like they've improved over time, so I'm not really going to dwell on those. The cRPGs are handled by another company, Owlcat, who seems to use their own style, and pretty much all of them are universally good.
I have more female portrait designs that you can choose for your character across Wrath of the Righteous and Kingmaker. The below aren't all of them, but they are the majority and I picked the ones I liked the most. Which should say quite a bit if they're the majority of them.
So, I should probably mention something about the romances. There is an LGBT+ romance.
This is the current romance list and this late into the game's development, I don't believe any more will be added.
Romances exclusively available to male characters:
- Camellia
- Wenduag
- Sosiel
Romances exclusively available to female characters:
- Lann
- Daeran
Romances available to both:
- Arueshalae
- Queen Galfrey (one of the major supporting characters in the game, I may be wrong about this and she might be a male-exclusive romance.)
There's a reason I mentioned the writing of the Pathfinder games. It's quite possibly the most inclusive setting I've ever seen. It's largely escaped the notice of the usual drama because the writing presents a lot of the themes of diversity as already normalized in the setting. Like Sosiel only has a preference for male characters, but it's treated as a character trait and not his only reason for being. The writers don't go out of their way to point it out at every possible opportunity, and his character arc doesn't revolve around it.
Two of the supporting cast in Wrath of the Righteous are a married LGBT couple, an orc woman and a human woman, and those two are part of your inner circle of advisors for the crusade throughout the game. You don't actually learn this until the start of the second chapter at the very earliest, and they don't tell you until you do a combination of probably asking too many questions, and them trusting you for safely reuniting them and everything you pulled off in the previous chapter. And I basically read this as them hiding this not because of any fear of persecution, and more that it's not most people's business to know when the group's waging a war against demons hell bent on ending the world as they know it.
Actually, upon further thought, pretty much all of the crusade leadership that you interact with are women. The game doesn't beat you over the head with this fact by calling out their genders, and the one party member who probably has the harshest words to say about the (lack of) progress they've made on resolving the situation (Regill as the leader of his regiment of Hellknights) never uses this angle to criticize them. A Hellknight only focused on practical results would never argue in such a way, really.
As for Avellone? No one's actually sure exactly what he contributed to in Wrath of the Righteous. Someone asked a week ago on the Steam forums and this was the official response.
"Hi!
Chris helped us with the feedback on the game's story and narrative and also conceptualized one companion."
I assumed that party member was Ember, but I've since heard that it wasn't. None of the other party members match his preferred style of writing and characterization that I'm generally aware of either.
I believe for Kingmaker, he wrote the party member Nok-Nok (a highly intelligent goblin among his people, you initially find him being threatened by another faction of goblins in a power struggle for claiming to be a favored priest of their worshipped god, and having thoughts about coexisting with your barony instead of marching to war like the rest).
Nok-Nok was actually a really fun character compared to the moody characters he tended to write in the other games he has been known to contribute (the only other ones I'm really aware of being Pillars of Eternity with Durance and Grieving Mother, and Divinity Original Sin 2 with Fane).
I personally loved Kingmaker, since it had a really atypical plot structure with a story that took place over roughly 3-4 in-game years. But the whole kingdom management stuff is hit or miss among the community. It appears to be a beloved game in the cRPG scene nowadays, but I would describe it as a love-hate relationship. Which is fine for a very ambitious first project. It's probably worth a playthrough purely for how unique it is, if you have 100+ hours to spare. It's a big game.
The writing of the party members in both games are incredible, in my opinion. At first glance they might be kind of tropey, but they actually have a lot of depth to them. And the core of both games really revolves around you and your party members' actions, the writers do a really great job at making the party feel like a family that actually cares about each other.
Like one of the first party members you meet in Kingmaker is a dwarf named Harrim who worships a god named Groteus, with a belief about how everything turns to dust in the end. You might think he's a defeatist, but he's actually not, despite what he may say when he's in the party. Make him the lead religious advisor for your barony/kingdom, and when he comes to you with information about a problem and what he suggests to resolve it, it turns out that he has a very unique angle. He generally respects other people's right to believe whatever they want to and doesn't really try to push his faith on anyone else, so his advice has this general vibe of 'everything comes to an end eventually, so you might as well make the people as happy as you can in a way that reminds them that this happiness is fleeting'.
That's not to say the writers aren't beyond reproach. I have... Things to say about Camellia, but again, Wrath of the Righteous is an unreleased game and it's best I wait until it's been out for a while before I really talk about her. But even then, I realize my negative views about her revolve around her as a character and not about how she's written, even if some of it might be problematic in the context of this thread.
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Oh, I found a picture of Wenduag from Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous.
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Speaking of gachas like Genshin Impact, I had been playing FFBE War of the Visions over the past year. I don't recommend it for various reasons, I'm kind of just still there because I'm in the stage where I've put in a bit too much to just drop it.
The female character designs have been extremely hit or miss. For one, you have dumb ones like this.
But lately, the non-collab/seasonal female character designs have steadily turned towards the better, kind of. There's still a lot of zetta ryouki among the designs and some are obviously still sexualized, but the good designs are real gems.
Ha. I generally gravitate towards playing archers instead of healers now, and it seems I kind of go out of the way to make my preferred character setup to be as non-threatening as possible while still someone to be taken seriously.
Like this is my character in FFXIV.
This outfit looks amazing in motion too. I've also had passing comments from people about how Lalafells look more intimidating than he does. It's an endless source of amusement for me.
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Speaking of gachas like Genshin Impact, I had been playing FFBE War of the Visions over the past year. I don't recommend it for various reasons, I'm kind of just still there because I'm in the stage where I've put in a bit too much to just drop it.
The female character designs have been extremely hit or miss. For one, you have dumb ones like this.
Oldoa of Fennes, one of the antagonistic factions in the game. She's supposed to be the right hand person for that nation's king.
But lately, the non-collab/seasonal female character designs have steadily turned towards the better, kind of. There's still a lot of zetta ryouki among the designs and some are obviously still sexualized, but the good designs are real gems.
Miranda, a wandering Red Mage who once sought to become a Samurai. She's since made peace with the idea that she doesn't have what it takes, so she turned towards being a Time Mage and Paladin as one of her subclasses instead. Now helping a princess rebel against her tyrannical king.
Ildyra, Leonis' chief accountant and leader of the queensguard. She's the game's first arithmetician, basically that game's version of the Calculator job in FFT.
Louelle, another member of the Leonis Queensguard and their chief scholar.
Lorelia, leader of a tribe of ninja. (She actually gets killed off in the same chapter that she was introduced as the lead character in. Many people in the fandom have never forgiven the assailant for that.)
Remure. I don't know what her deal is, as she's yet to be released in the Global version.
Ildyra, Leonis' chief accountant and leader of the queensguard. She's the game's first arithmetician, basically that game's version of the Calculator job in FFT.
Louelle, another member of the Leonis Queensguard and their chief scholar.
Lorelia, leader of a tribe of ninja. (She actually gets killed off in the same chapter that she was introduced as the lead character in. Many people in the fandom have never forgiven the assailant for that.)
Remure. I don't know what her deal is, as she's yet to be released in the Global version.
Ha. I generally gravitate towards playing archers instead of healers now, and it seems I kind of go out of the way to make my preferred character setup to be as non-threatening as possible while still someone to be taken seriously.
Like this is my character in FFXIV.
This outfit looks amazing in motion too. I've also had passing comments from people about how Lalafells look more intimidating than he does. It's an endless source of amusement for me.
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Louelle, another member of the Leonis Queensguard and their chief scholar.
I actually really like this design, but thanks to what this thread has done to me I can't help but notice the pigeon toes. Like, we had an entire page discussing how maybe it's not always done for bad intentions, and some people actually just have pigeon toes, but I still can't help to notice it, even if in this case it's a minor detail.
Anyway, since we are talking about gacha, it gives me the perfect segway for my bread and butter game: Fire Emblem Heroes.
Because a recently added character tops everything this game has done before.
I'm not the only one that thinks she looks incredibly stupid right? What is that humanoid form? Would you have even guessed she's the same character as the icy horse-thing below?
I've tolereted a lot of stupid fanservicey design in this game, and I probably have an higher tolerance level than other people here, but this design in particular is the one that broke me for some reason. Where are your pants, lady? Or at least a longer skirt or something, anything that can be considered sensible, instead of just fetish fuel to show your legs off and your stupid shoes in every single picture?
Other characters are given mini-skirts and high heels for the usual reasons but... I just find it more egregious with her than the other bad ones, and for that reason I can't take the character seriously. I usually don't notice that a character is being used for fanservice immediatly (unless if they have inflated breasts) because I'm dense and desensitized, but with this particular character I noticed right away. Doesn't help that the rest of her design doesn't feel inspired at all either.
And like, this isn't a random nobody they decided would be the fanservice character, or someone that has the excuse of being a beach alt, or another holyday/vacation, nope, it's the regular form of this character who in the lore is supposed to be an extremely powerful goddess and I just can't see it. For comparison, here are all the other goddesses currently in the game.
Ashera, Goddess of Order
Yune, Goddess of Chaos
Hel, Goddess of Death
Eir, (Demi) Goddess of Life
Naga, King of Divine Dragons
Mila, the Earth Mother
Freyja, Goddess of Nightmares
Sothis, the Beginning
Seiros, the Immaculate One
Loki, the Trickster
Yune, Goddess of Chaos
Hel, Goddess of Death
Eir, (Demi) Goddess of Life
Naga, King of Divine Dragons
Mila, the Earth Mother
Freyja, Goddess of Nightmares
Sothis, the Beginning
Seiros, the Immaculate One
Loki, the Trickster
And then one last example that I could only find a giant picture of, sorry:
Uh, I honestly thought that the difference would be night and day, but looking back, while most of the other gods are given much more dignity and respect, there are also some who have problems. Naga, Sothis and the last two are the bad ones, while the rest are okay (at least imho, but it would be interesting to hear everyone's criticism on them).
But even then, I feel like Nifl is the sillyest design of all to the point that it sticks out. Sothis also shows more legs than I remembered and that is very bad, but maybe because the pose is less stupid, or for some other reason, it doesn't offend me as much. Naga has very stupid cleavage, but idk the art make her looks regal and otherworldly enough for her title in spite of it.
And those two designs were taken directly from the original games, so the Heroes' team isn't responsible for them. They are responsible for Loki and Thorr though. And while my main problem with Thorr is that no warrior goddess should wear high heels (damn it, why do you have to be like this gaming industry), Loki is...
Yeah, she is something, I won't even try to defend a design that everyone knows was made with a single objective in mind. However there is one thing that makes me think Nifl is actually worse than Loki, and as such the worst Godlike character in the entire game: Context.
And yes, a sexualized design is bad in all contexts, doesn't matter if there is a Kojima-lore explanation, or if the creator admits that it was made just to be fanservicey, however I hold the opinion that a fanservice design is made worse if the narrative ignores that it's there, and the characters act as if everything is normal.
With Loki, for one she is the one character of the entire list that is HIDING her godlike status. It's been years since she was created and she is still hiding her indentity from us, the player, as well as 99% of the cast. Only Thorr knows what's up because they are on the same side, and while Thorr awaits the fateful moment in which the plot will finally happen (Ragnarok, I presume) mostly keeping to the sidelines and testing the strenght of mortals, Loki spends her time dicking around, trolling the other characters, trying to make hilarious hijinks happen (read: pointless conflict and war) and making sex jokes. I'm not kidding about the sex jokes. The other characters are unnverved and flustered by her mere presence half the time, so it is made clear that they aren't oblivious to the fact this woman is running around half-naked and acts very shady.
Contrast with Nifl. We have very little material on her, but it's enough to understand that she is pretty much: "Yes, young child. It is I, the God-Dragon that your country worships. I speak in a very serious and icy tone, and I am very old and powerful. You are right to be afraid. Come now, I have a very serious mission for you" and I'm sorry I just can't help but laugh. I would pay gold for a character to say "ok, this is all very intriguing, but aren't you cold?".
Both designs are bad, both should go throught some revisions before being put in a game, but if you have to use such a design, at least make it so the character fits the design and have people react to them accordingly. I'm aware that not everyone agrees on this, but I vastly prefer when a creator adds a line of dialogue to adress a particularly bad design, rather than not.
On one hand, if they add the line it means they were aware that they were doing something bad, so why didn't they just go back and change it? But on the other hand, if they don't add the line... maybe they weren't aware? Which scares me, because it means they think that this is completely normal. "It's what women wear in real life too, right? I couldn't know, I last saw one back in high-school".
So to put a bow on this whole thing: Newest Fire Emblem character. I think she's hot garbage, maybe even the worst in the game other than like the worst of the 1000-old dragons, but maybe I'm overreacting. What do you guys, gals and non-binary pals think of her? Yay, or nay?
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This is what Sothis looked like in Three Houses:
This is what Sothis looked like in Three Houses:
I kind of assumed that whoever designed her had a leg/foot fetish or some kind.
Yeah, this pretty much goes to show that I'm blind as a bat for such things. Or at least I used to be. Back when I first played Three Houses I didn't notice it and didn't think Sothis was fanservicey. "A straight up improvement over Awakening and Nowi, good character design" was my opinion back then.
To be fair I wouldn't think anyone was that ice horse because I didn't know they turned into animals in that game haha. If nothing else I love her coat and the dress is a very pretty color, but you raise a lot of good points otherwise.
Which raises the question, how much liberty do the artists have in this situation? Was the artist the one responsible for her showing so much legs and wearing heels, or did the higher ups order him to draw her exactly like that?
The coat is actually pretty nice and is the one element of her design I would keep, other than her hair. But then we run into the problem of her being a serious character and an ancient dragon. I'm all for fluffy coats and cute characters, but is it really appropriate for her personality and role? Idk, this character is a mess in multiple ways to me.
To be honest, Sothis is "slightly" better because she doesn't have the personality of a 10-year-old
Also
i find it hilarious that you can marry with the person inside your head
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I won't lie, marrying someone that exists inside your head is a bit scary for an avid player of dating games (ok, a quarter dating game in FE's case) because at that point we are going too meta for my tastes. But then again I played Doki Doki with a literal girl that lives inside your computer and falls in love with you for real, and after that nothing will ever be as scary, or as meta in any dating game
For all is worth
Since it's a psychical horror game the whole thing is framed as the character being insane and not endearing as she did some fucked up stuff before then, you end up stopping her with her later showing regret about the whole thing
After importing a picture, if you click on it and press the arrows button, you can adjust the size.
Tell me you're sexist and draw unrealistic poses without telling me. Is there a genderswap mod showing what a male character doing this pose looks like?This pose gets me each time and I have Mona but slowly avoiding it since everything is just embarrassing.
I kinda didn't play Three Houses because of characters like her.
Pretty sure is the same one that did cyber sleuth
the first one is your detective mentor and the human form of Alpha Mon the second is your friend and tamer of omegamon/omnimon
Yeah...
I'm normally super nervous about jumping in to those kinds of convos because the chance of getting jumped on is high, but even I finally had to say something. And now I'm terrified lol.
OP
OP
that thread is about to hit bingo. "rl women like dressing sexy" "maybe she CHOSE to dress like that" "it's bc of her backstory" "she has her boobs out to distract the enemy" "what's wrong with sexy outfits anyway" "but cosplayers"
God, played that game recently and the char designs were awful. Looked at screens from the sequel and it seems just as bad.
To be honest that statue could have been much worse, besides sexy ninja outfit. It could have been the yugiri(zombie land saga) version of kunoichi which essential is hiding as prostitutes or escorts in plain sight, which if gaijin gumba's which ninja is correct about them is actually what they were back in ancient Japan more spies and infiltrators than the assassin's in all blue. Granted that is just me getting second hand knowledge of the subject. But if that is true yeah it could have been worse. If we were to even argue accuracy ciri is in more of an outfit kunoichi would actually wear, not yennefer so people arguing about historical accuracy with yennefer are doing it in pretty much bad faith because that isn't really true that's just modern sexed up ninja outfit
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Random tangent, but I started playing a mobile game called Alchemy Stars recently (has some typical gacha design BS but is better than some) and follow the subreddit for the game to keep up with announcements, etc. The game team put out a feedback survey today and a woman in the subreddit commented that she requested having a gender-neutral/choosable-gender MC since they're a self-insert anyway (no face, no default name), and she got down-voted to hell + one user said that people who want to be able to identify with an MC (and thus can't because the MCs are almost always male) "lack confidence" among other horrible things.
Normally I'd be able to ignore this better but after that thread today, I'm just feeling super ragey and can't stop thinking about it. Sigh.
Normally I'd be able to ignore this better but after that thread today, I'm just feeling super ragey and can't stop thinking about it. Sigh.
OMG! This is some bullcrap. "This feature doesn't interest ME personally, so you are stupid for wanting it" is the pinaccle of "Fuck you, got mine" logic. What is these people's problem anyway? Do they think changing the pronouns in the script and adding a whole sub-section in the menu to select your gender will take away precious development time from... whatever game modes and contents this game has, or do they simply take pleasure in the unhappiness of others?
Not having a gender option for a blank slate protagonist was stupid back in the 80s-90s and it only became stupider since having it started to become common place. Objecting to it now is pretty much being stuck in the past with how standard it has become.
Fallout 4 lets you do it, GTA Online lets you do it, all pokémon games let you do it, other gachas (genshin, Kingdom Hearts X, FEH and so on) let you do it, Persona 3 lets you do it... but not Persona 4 still. Yo Atlus, how about a Golden edition Plus? I can understand not doing it for Persona 5 because yeah, Kamoshida and the main villain would treat you way differently and in general there are major differences in how a girl criminal would be treated compared to a boy criminal, so it would change the story a lot, but P4 has no excuse.
Heck even dating sims and porn games made entirely for the cis-het-male "gamers" (I am thinking of HuniePop, I will admit it) let you do it, just for the heck of it.
The point is, it's becoming more common than ever, so what even is the problem? I can only see it as that reddit community fot that particular game being stuck in the past.
Or at least I hope that's what it is.
Yeah, Atlus doesn't like using putting female main characters in their games. Think the last one was FeMC from Persona 3 Portable and the SMT mobile game. And look at FeMC, it took almost a decade for them to finally acknowledge she existed in a spinoff game and a play.
The same is with Zelda. The gender of Link doesn't affect the story; you can have a female Link protect the princess and at most what would change is how Zelda interacts with the silent protagonist.
For Persona 5, the gender of Joker might affect the story, but they should have still allowed the player to pick between a male or female Joker. But I can't expect too much of Atlus when it comes to portraying women. We just need to look at what they did to Ann. Or that they let you date Futaba, who is like a little sister to Joker. Just to pander to the male otaku crowd.
Adding a female Joker wouldn't solve the issues of sexism in the game, but it would be a good start, even if it would take some effort. The main reason I mentioned it was for the sake of comparison, because even without knowing the game in question I can tell that it probably doesn't even have the P5 excuse where the gender of the MC affects the story in a meaningful way. And even then, it is just an excuse. If they can really make a GTA with a female protagonist, then it's perfectly possible to make a young juvenile MC, you just need to spend time and effort that Atlus certainly has, they are not a small indie company.
