I feel like the problem with unnecessary sexy womens clothing in many
games and comics is relatively well known and untill yesterday I would
have said that we are making progress in this area. This changed today
when I received an answer to a question that I had send Bigpoint, the
producer of “Drakensang online”, a free fantasy MMORPG.The question I send
them asked something like “hey team, why are women now expected to fight without pants all of a sudden? I hope this is a halloween thing because I don’t really like it. I thought you were doing really well when you added more skintone options some time ago. It would be cool if you told me what changes you made in the male costume for halloween, I wasn’t really able to make anything out. Cheers, [my name]”The answer they send, you can see above. It says: “Hello, a lot of users asked that it become better visible if a character is male or female. That is why this change was made. With kind regards […]” etc.
I don’t even know if I should be angry about this or just sad. Before female and male characters had basically the same clothing. There is no good reason (as far as I know) why gender should be made more vissible. Also, hoovering your mouse above a character will give you their name
and a (often gendered) title. This is much easier than zooming in to
spot the boob-window. You can see the changes in the pictures above. (The characters still look like before in the character menu, that is where I was able to make the before pictures.)I really want to make a point to Bigpoint about this, so pleas reblog or like this post if you agree with me. If you play the game, it would be awesome if you left a message in their feedback-forums or tell them what you think via their support page
A propos gender signifiers in warrior costume design… Now this case tells us a lot about the studio’s approach to creativity.
Developers got asked to differentiate gender of the characters, so removing women’s pants and adding cleavages was the best solution they could come up with? Really?
Assuming there truly is a huge demand for making female and male costumes more distinct, couldn’t they accommodate the designs in a more dignified way?
And if they really had to remove some items to make character’s sex/gender obvious, why not men’s shirts? Why it’s the female characters who need “adjustments”, while male ones remain the default?
But considering Drakensang’s track record, we shouldn’t be all that surprised.
Thank you @lunaia for bringing this issue to us!
~Ozzie
@whereismywizardhat submitted:
From the just announced Shin Megami Tensei IV: Final
The one on the far right is Nozomi, a demon hunter who was a minor character in IV who the protagonists assist in a sidequest chain. The new game’s artwork switches her leather motorcycle gear (seen below) for a boob hugging sweater, hot pants, and thigh highs. The only positive I can think of is they let her keep her shotgun.
It’s really disappointing. Nozomi was one of the more likeable characters within IV, with her hobby of photography and her struggle to get stronger like the protagonist forming a concrete arc.
A person with decision making power actually concluded that skin-tight leather with extra straps to accentuate curves was not sexy and should be swapped out for a mini-dress with visible garter belts and thigh highs?
– wincenworks
So, Circe is a Wonder Woman villain who goes all the way back to 1959 and for some reason – out of all the possible outfits and designs, this is the one that DC Universe Online went with.
Of course, there’s concept art for different designs:
But of course, that’s what they used for the gritty dystopian future that only appears in the intro video. Thanks DC Universe Online.
– wincenworks
Look, I like alliteration as much as the next person – but I feel the fact that they needed to add “Warrior” into Jessica’s summary says a lot about the design priorities here.
Biana’s design in particular looks like someone tried to make her practical but then was forced to swap out the pants with thigh highs. Well, at least they didn’t put boobs on the weird blob thing.
– wincenworks
Dragon Pals sounds like it should be a Saturday morning cartoon about friendship and magic… instead it appears to be a browser-based MMO attempting to combine How to Train Your Dragon and elves with lowest bidders providing different assets.
Of course, it has to have the obligatory lineup pic… even though if you ask me they’d be better off sticking to the cute dragons angle.
– wincenworks