Okay.
First, this is a thread about positive sexuality. What that means is, we have to be talking about something with at least some level of sexuality in it. So dismissing Bayonetta because it's chock full of sexuality is, inherently, pretty dumb. It's like saying 'what's the best car, by the way all four wheeled vehicles are disqualified'.
I really don't know where you got that from. I did not say the problem with Bayonetta was sexualization, you're just assuming that.
And, I mean, it's hard to not just reiterate what everyone else has said, but Bayonetta is, absolutely, positive sexuality, because she is, at no point, made a victim of it. Why does she get naked? Because she wants to! Because she enjoys doing it! Because she wants to show off! It's not, "because she breathes through her skin" or some other nonsense where 'she has to' or 'is forced to'. And no, she is not 'forced to' by her hair being her weapon, as, just like Jeanne, she has the choice available to wear regular, non-hair clothes and still fight and summon demons. She also isn't just blissfully unaware of what's going on.
Bayonetta is not a sentient being. All her choices are made by a team composed mostly by man. Specifically, the director of her game is a known perv (More on that later).
And yes, she is forced by her hair being a weapon and, for some reason, at the same time, her outfit. This is equivalent to female armor in RPGs being skimpy, having less coverage or having the precise shape of breasts despite this being ridiculous and making no sense. There's no reason for her outfit to be made of the same thing she uses to attack her enemies other than "Hey, she'll get naked using this power". Okay, the game provides other outfit choices, but I don't think Link's outfit is canon. Clearly, her default outfit is how the game is presented and, as such, is the intended design here.
In fact, let's compare Bayonetta to... pretty much any poorly sexualized character. *Usually* your typical pointlessly sexualized character is some random nobody, but now with giant tits and bikini armor that doesn't cover more than 20% of their body, and they in no way ever acknowledge that they are wearing bikini armor, or if it is ever acknowledge, it's done in a passing joke where the character gets flustered like "Oh no they see my butt, if only I could have just worn pants!"
Bayonetta is not only wearing a suit that covers the vast majority of her skin, has pretty regular sized breasts, and at no point is she made a joke of, either at the expense of her as a character or her sexuality or the way she dresses.
This isn't really true? Plenty of pointlessly sexualized characters are the protagonists of their games, or relevant characters, not random nobodies who know no better. Lara Croft, Kitana (and her equivalents), the entire female cast of Dead or Alive, Harley Quinn in Arkham Asylum, Tracer, some of the characters from Tekken, and even Samus got progressively sexualized and even got a skin-tight suit with heels (!). Bayonetta is no different here. There are all examples of toxic sexualization, even if they're not there to be made fun of. They're there for pandering.
Also, this is Bayonetta:
Her body does not resemble the body of a regular woman. Sexualization does not only come in the shape of huge breasts.
Quiet, as an example, is a poorly sexualized character because there's a poor excuse for why she dresses the way she does, it doesn't even make sense *with* the reason she's dressed the way she does, and her personality does not acknowledge it at all or make sense with it. It's hastily thrown on her just to add tits for the sake of tits.
The camera does not exploit her, she uses it to enjoy herself. It's not sneakily trying to ogle her while she's unaware, she's winking at it and posing. Not much else to that, so I won't go any further.
Bayonetta at no point does what she does for the sake of any character's sexual satisfaction or arousal. She dances in the same manner, all the time, whether anyone is watching or not. She dances for one person: Herself.
Yes, Quiet is another example of terrible sexualization. Because they came up with excuses to justify something that was there to pander to the male gaze.
And, no, Bayonetta is never by herself. She's always being watched by at least one person: the player. Which is the target of all this pandering. Again, she's not a sentient being. Everything she does was a decision made by a team of men with their own satisfaction and the player's in mind. She's an object being exploited, and that automatically invalidades any intention of making her a "sex-positive" character. This is not what sex-positive means.
And I was gonna tackle the "Oh but Kamiya is a guy and said he wanted Bayonetta sexy so that nullifies everything else!" argument, but I'm short on time, so I'll summarize it: Bayonetta is meant to be a complete play off of Dante, who is himself a hyper masculine sexy bad attitude kind of guy, 2, Bayonetta was designed by Mari, a woman, according to what she would like, and 3, none of that fukken matters anyway because you don't exactly see dev interviews before you play the game. Bayonetta delivers a specific message -- Sexy is good, sexy is fun, be sexy for yourself and fuck everyone else. Who cares who 'wrote the message'.
A lot people care about who wrote the message, as that is heavily indicative of what is the intent of their message. And, hey, I'll have you know: women can reproduce sexism and objectification as well. They were raised in the same society as us. They're influenced by all of this systemic sexism as much as we are. So the claim that she was designed by a woman, therefore gets a pass, holds no weight.
Also, she did not create Bayonetta from scratch. She might have designed her, but the concept of the character was made by Kamiya, and she had to follow that.
The key difference here is that Dante's hyper masculinity is a power fantasy for men. And Bayonetta's hyper femininity is a sex fantasy also for men.
