Its a very tired argument indeed, especially when it evolves to "it doesn't exist " to "it exists but it's not that bad" to "whatever, I like it"
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Why women criticise sexualised character designs | OT3 | "make her look more...corpulent, more stuffed where the eyes can't escape."
- Thread starter Persephone
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Its a very tired argument indeed, especially when it evolves to "it doesn't exist " to "it exists but it's not that bad" to "whatever, I like it"
It feels like it is very common for a lot of straight men to instantly just take "I like sexy women so it would be hypocritical of me to be against this" attitude to sexualization of women in media and handwave it away, or they get defensive because they think that toning cheesecake down in the most mainstream of mainstream fiction means that someone is going to break into their house to take their Danger Girl and Red Sonja comics away.
Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
If there's any franchise that should be doing it it should be SMT. It's ridiculous that Aogami is covered head to toe when SMTV has stuff like cleopatra, artemis and now this.
That said overall, the weird pandery stuff feels very out of place in the mainline franchise. Doesn't feel like something that would have been included a couple decades ago. I don't think anyone was really jonesing for jiggle physics in SMT but idk.
Right?! Some of myth and history's greatest promiscuous-as-hell figures were male.
It would be really funny if they made an animation with this level of... whatever this is... to MaraVia SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
Give Mara jiggle physics
I feel like SMT/Persona "tries" to be equal opportunity but skews toward the male audience. Seeing Maara in P5 I had to see what that was all about and I learned something about Buddhism in the process but there's also stuff like Ann's battle costume and the teacher/maid that you can seduce.
They try and get a pass because 'it's a demon and that's their defining quality' but to me that's a dodge.
They try and get a pass because 'it's a demon and that's their defining quality' but to me that's a dodge.
Member when SMT could have someone practically naked on screen and not have it be anywhere near as egregious as that?Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
I approve. #LetMaraWaggle
I just played P5R on PC and Ann has boob jiggle in her Persona-awakening cutscene, and then nothing after. I don't remember this at all on Playstation, but maybe I just didn't notice.
So many video game women suffer from no spine disease lol. Honestly we never get sexy men in smt games on the same level as the women, which sucks cause they can't even be equal opportunity with it. I'd feel mildly better if they made it equal but alas.Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
I feel like I remember it getting some pushback at the time, nothing huge though. I didn't notice it the first time I played either.
Not to get too off topic, but I really like Angelica Jade Bastien's review of Poor Things as a recent example of a writer confidently critiquing sex in popular media in contrast to the majority of other critics who suddenly have nothing real to say on the subject while being able to find words for every other bit of minutiae. Why is it not more obvious to those who pay so close attention?
Is Poor Things the Best We Can Do for Female Sexuality Onscreen?
Emma Stone fully commits to a banal rendition of faux-feminist sexual freedom.
www.vulture.com
yeah, i wish some kaneko designs would get these kind of ridiculous animations, imagine this one :
Some butt and package giggle for everyone! (of course mara too)
I remember playing Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2 because I heard that the combat/gameplay was pretty fun and immediately got an eye full of the bondage scene with Nepgear and slight jiggle physics when I just happened to like...bump the camera a little.
And of course you see things from people like "this is fine" and I'm like "She's a fucking teenager probably" and then of course the usual "She's not real so it's okay".
MMMMMMMM.
I thought her ass was her knee....Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
yeah, i wish some kaneko designs would get these kind of ridiculous animations, imagine this one :
Some butt and package giggle for everyone! (of course mara too)
I always felt like Incubus was kind of in a more seductive male pose, but he never really has any animations where he is interacting with his "horn".
yeah, i wish some kaneko designs would get these kind of ridiculous animations, imagine this one :
Some butt and package giggle for everyone! (of course mara too)
If Shemyaza isn't in Vengeance with all the Devil Summoner pulls we riot
Also Dionysus deserves a mention here.
God Kaneko designs were so fucking good. Doi is getting there but it feels like Atlus keeps mandating Dumb Shit
I recently learned that the whole idea of the sexy demoness/Lust demon in pop culture, especially in Western/Christian inspired works is mostly due to Medieval views on Lilith who was a very popular character in folklore and stories and may have been the result people not getting the satire of an 8th Century book 'Alphabet of Sirach' which exploded her popularity with people.Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
Also Lilith may have also likely just meant to be a Screech Owl in her one mention Isaiah 34:14 was just a list of beast; this wouldn't be even be the only time this has happened, so many damn monsters and aliens throughout history, to Vampires, Mothman, Hopkinsville Owls etc turned out to be Owls... So technically yeah, Owls are the mother of demons).
Lilith deserves better, I say while liking characters like Morrigan and Lady Devimon.
Dang I really like this review, saw this movie without looking up the content warnings and man was it a mistake. It's nice to see an in depth analysis of the movie that highlighted it's glaring issues, and is really well written. And just to add personally I hated that when the movie came out some people/reviewers were pushing it as a feminist version of Frankenstein, when Mary Shelley's work is already very impressive especially so for the time period felt super dismissive of her work. (also sry if this is bit off topic)
Because I'm probably the only member of staff that will play it any time soon.
For every little step Megaten thinks goes towards being equal opportunity, it takes like three back, maybe even seven back as of late if you look at SMTIV Apocalypse and, to some extent, SMTV. The former had one of the most embarrassing, gross attempts to pander to an imagined target audience I've seen across the series in the form of Toki. It's not just a Persona problem.
Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
Imagine a male character doing this in a game that isn't a yaoi game. Countless "anti-censorship" and "it's just cheesy sexy time stuff and not hurting anyone" chuds would lose their minds and call for censorship without the slightest hint of irony.
Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
This is genuinely embarrassing. I cannot believe there are people who would be convinced to buy a game because something this brazen is in it.
I hate being tokenized this way so much. Equally as much as I do when receiving accusations of "double standards" whenever I criticize oversexualization, because I happen to like NSFW stuff.
They're stupid mindsets that are only ever applied against women and minorities.
That reminds me of when someone tried to use me saying a friend of mine liked one of the Stellar Blade outfits as some kind of justification for the objectification being OK. The entire point was that people have varying thresholds for what they find acceptable, and that women are perfectly capable of liking racy stuff while still being bothered by it. But no, people are quick to discredit anything as soon as one example comes up of someone being less bothered by it.
Dunno if this is too tinfoil-hat but I do think it might, in part, be a calculated marketing gimmick to get existing SMTV owners to check out Vengeance. The same way Cleopatra was probably the most blatant thing in the original release ontop of being a broken DLC demon.
The Qadištu is such a cool fucking idea for a story, but no way in hell was ATLUS ever gonna be capable of telling that story with the maturity it demands.
It is rare to have a stylish action game with a female protagonist who is not heavily sexualized, but they exist.
Love and Deepspace
If you search for this game, you will find an official English website that describes it as a romance simulation game. That is true--it is an otome game. What the website seems to have omitted in the blurb is that it is also a stylish action game that plays like Honkai Impact 3rd and Punishing Gray Raven, though like HI3 and PGR, the gameplay is simplified compared to DMC and Bayonetta to accommodate the primarily mobile player base.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3V6T2E4u8mo
Icey.
It is a 2-D action game. The protagonist has zettai ryouiki and a tight fitting outfit, but the graphics makes it not something the game focuses on (it's actually rather hard to notice).
I always felt like Incubus was kind of in a more seductive male pose, but he never really has any animations where he is interacting with his "horn".
It's funny how Incubus is this little demonic goblin while succubus is
the usual design lol.
While talking about SMTV, I love Angel's redesign. Went from bondage Angel, who didn't really fit with the other Angel designs, to
Suitably divine with an edge of creepiness.
Edit:
Oh hey where my avatar is from :P
Can confirm the gameplay is heavily modified for mobile controls, but it's satisfying enough for what it is and can get pretty difficult in higher levels. Love and Deep space is also pretty good with how it treats MC, since the male characters are the eye-candy.
MC does not hold back in the most recent cards omg.
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That doesn't look quite like my thing, but I will admit that girl looks very cool! I'm a sucker for a good waistcoat.
I actually own Icey already; it was quite some time ago but I found it to be pretty charming and fun. I don't remember it being all too close to that style of game, but it WAS a long time ago so my memory is just hazy.
Have nothing much to add other than Rika is still pretty and a WLW goddess (Art from PKMN Masters EX):
Dunno if they are going to be relevant to you since they are Brazilians, but they are Leon and Nilce from "Cade a chave" and "Coisa de Nerd".
DNF Duel finally officially announced Nen Master... Not a mid action pose, that's her official render stance lmao
Far cry from the banger design of the Inquisitor
Been in love with Rika since they first introduced her ingame.Have nothing much to add other than Rika is still pretty and a WLW goddess (Art from PKMN Masters EX):
For all of its problems, Scarlet and Violet had some neat characters.
I just wanted to stop by this thread because I replayed Prince of Persia: Warrior Within and finished it yesterday
What a dumpster fire for the female characters. Like holy shit. The edginess and appeal to teenage boys is almost too much. Carries over to the drab brown environment too.
Which is a real shame, because the game itself was a lot more enjoyable than I ever remember it being when I first played it almost 20 years ago. I didn't appreciate the metroidvania design of the game world back then, but thought it was well designed this go around. Only wish it wasn't so damn ugly.
Kaileena and Shahdee are trash designs through and through. Dunno what they were thinking.
What a dumpster fire for the female characters. Like holy shit. The edginess and appeal to teenage boys is almost too much. Carries over to the drab brown environment too.
Which is a real shame, because the game itself was a lot more enjoyable than I ever remember it being when I first played it almost 20 years ago. I didn't appreciate the metroidvania design of the game world back then, but thought it was well designed this go around. Only wish it wasn't so damn ugly.
Kaileena and Shahdee are trash designs through and through. Dunno what they were thinking.
It's like the opposite ends of the chest slider in Soul Calibur 😅
DNF Duel finally officially announced Nen Master... Not a mid action pose, that's her official render stance lmao
Far cry from the banger design of the Inquisitor
I absolutely fell in love with the first game. I bought 2 and 3 for myself of Christmas. I popped in the 2nd one and immediately noped out of it after seeing the metal thong. I was 12. I honestly think it's the biggest reason i started to push back on games because wtf were they thinking!
I actually quite like that girl's design, uh, anime sized chest aside. I forget how Striker looks in the game, but in a lot of official art she's also prone to being depicted with some pretty disproportionate breasts. I guess that's just a thing the character designs of the game do for some reason.
DNF Duel finally officially announced Nen Master... Not a mid action pose, that's her official render stance lmao
Far cry from the banger design of the Inquisitor
Kind of curious to see what y'all think about Jeff Gerstmann's answer to a viewer email talking about Stellar Blade:
View: https://youtu.be/rJ--kHdXHZk?si=Vlw9Ozbneo9-aQu3&t=6528
(Timestamped link, but if it doesn't work the section starts at 1:48:48ish and goes til about 1:58:00)
The Jeff Gerstmann Show 099: The Mashima Zaibatsu
We talk about hitting 33333333333 in Tekken 8, as well as Stellar Blade’s frustrating animation stuff, the absolute joy of playing Minishoot’ Adventures, and...youtu.be
On one hand he rightfully calls out the "censorship!" chuds, but he also leans heavily on the, "plenty of women have said they like that kind of game so clearly it's not that big of a deal" reasoning. A lot of his response boils down to, "It's whatever, cheesy sexualized games will always exist and it's not harming anyone so...whatever."
Part of the initial question asks if these types of games hamper public perception of gaming compared to, say, movies and other media. Jeff brings "sexploitation" movies up a bit into his answer and, again, falls on the, "they existed then, they still exist now, and nobody seems to care so...whatever."
I feel like an important point of comparison there is that movies may use fictional characters like games, but the on-screen actors are very real people and the "behind the scenes" environment on B- and C-movies has drastically changed so the films are—most of the time—less gross when taken as a whole.
I dunno, I didn't really expect a different response from Jeff (I don't think he has bad political thoughts, but he's always seemed kind of apathetic towards certain social issues) but at the same time I hate hearing someone with a relatively big platform use talking points that are mostly used to shut down any arguments against sexualisation in games.
Pretty disappointed in him for this. I am a long-time follower of Jeff and have always enjoyed his takes on the industry. Even if I don't agree with many of his personal tastes on games, I respect his reasoning and think his experience and insight on the industry is almost unparalleled among journalists.
This is one of the few times where I've seen him put his foot so thoroughly in his mouth. The fact he felt it was okay for him to tell us the skimpy outfits are just fine, and actually women like them too, so shut up, is just completely embarrassing. I understand his point that there should be room in the games industry for everything, and it's not like he is arguing in support of the "Free Stellar Blade" crowd, but just this once I would have hoped he could look at that situation and go "maybe we've had enough middle aged white straight cis guys comment on this, I should defer to other voices."
He even seemed to almost realize the issue with this halfway through his response, but instead of more directly acknowledging and exploring it, he kind of just kept going about how "nobody wanted to ban Team Ninja games 15 years ago" as if times, audiences and society haven't changed.
Jeff is not a bad guy and I think he has grown significantly as a person over the last decade of me following him... this is one of the rare times his opinion just felt tone deaf and unnecessary.
Yeah, having followed Giant Bomb since 2010 I'd say that's pretty much spot on analysis and what I'd expect from Jeff and the old Giant Bomb staff as a whole. What really disappointed and drove this home to me was goty-discussions the year Nier Automata came out. You have a tableful of guys with a shared century of experience in games industry and reviews waxing poetic about how wonderful the storybeats are and how the game touched their soul but when the one female member of staff pushes against this by saying she didn't want to play for more than 8 hours due to the horniness of the game her opinion was just brushed aside. Being able to identify more with a robot in a videogame than your colleague and friend explaining her stance really stuck to my mind.
I think it's very interesting how quickly men, even supposedly well meaning men, jump to conflating criticism with banning. Team Ninja games absolutely got heavy criticism 15 years ago. OtherM is a game so drooping with gross sexism that even a lot of chuds had a hard time defending it, for example, and that was 14 years ago. Sexualization was a huge part of that criticism.
Not saying Jeff is as such a bad person, not even a flat out sexist person, but he has heavy blindspots and is very dismissive of criticism from women when it concerns sexism. A lot of men are.
That anecdote on Nier really is apt to how it often goes.
Using DOA as an example is also really interesting because it's part of a trend I keep noticing with DOA and a lot of this in particular, the rewriting of history.
I remember the criticisms of DOA back then as much of it came from DOA's women fans who loved the series but felt like they were being pushed out because of how more and more they were pushing the sexualization and objectification in both the main series and especially their extreme side series. I was one of those women and saw so many women just leave the series because it became clear Team Ninja didn't want them around... And then male fans and influencers started declaring women NEVER played DOA (despite DOA3&4 starting many women's competitive careers), especially when it was believed DOA6 was going to tone down the sexualization (which it didn't). I remember people like MatPat pulling that shit and just seeing it become more common and common throughout the CFGC fandom.
Via SMTV Vengeance previews.
We need the guys to catch up to women unabashedly working their sexuality. Men are so boring just standing there, dressing normally, basic camera on their face.
I mean... C'mon, for Crissakes...
I never played the Switch release, and I'd thought about snagging it on PS5 just to give it a go... but nope, no thanks.
It's just so embarassing. My wife and I enjoy a lot of the same kind of games, and I enjoy that we can discuss what we like about them, or the stuff that is problematic even if we enjoy most of it.
But this? She'd just be uncomfortable, and I'd be non-plussed. Well passed the realm of 'problematic'.
This is how it is for my husband and I as well. We both have hot takes about the different kinds of games we play. For the Persona series, we've both just said that we are mostly done with the entire IP not just for the way Persona 5 handled Ann in particular, but just because the setting has been the same thing in every game for a long time since 3 (the whole kids in high school, slice-of-life, etc) and we're both just getting burnt out on it.
And we've both come to a unanimous conclusion that neither of us will touch Stellar Blade (he definitely won't) unless it's....free or something and I want to torture myself. He wasn't a big fan of Nier either honestly.