Look, I’ve been employed as a designer for two years now, and maybe that’s not that long; I’m at least sure I don’t have the same kind of industry experience that the designers in charge of this train wreck probably do, but I do know one thing:
Design that fails to communicate its intended message is bad design.
It is, in my opinion, the chore element that separates what we do from Fine Art – fine art is a personal expression. Someone can argue with the conclusions that you came to in fine art but ultimately, it’s your territory, your message, your composition, your voice, your story.
When you’re a hired designer, everything changes. It’s their story, theircharacter, their message, their voice.
Putting aside the obvious pandering and intent to profit off of misogynistic ideals in female video game characters for just an instant, let’s talk about Charlotte.
Charlotte [evidently, from what I’ve admittedly heard through the grapevine; this game is not yet out in my country] uses a masquerade of charm and innocence to seduce men for their wealth. When I heard this, I was shocked, because from the moment I saw her outfit, she never looked like someone I could trust.
If she’s supposed to look demure, make her look demure, goddammit. You shouldn’t need a greenhorn like me to tell you these things. Learn to treat your female characters with more respect.
Awesome redesign accompanied by an awesome writeup, thank you, pixelcut!
One more thing I’d add about the difference between design (hired or not) and fine art, is that design is supposed to serve the same purpose for everyone who sees it. To communicate an intended message, as pixelcut puts it.
The problem with how Charlotte looks basically boils down to the whole issue our blog concerns: that a lot of female character designs, particularly female warrior costumes, do not tell us who we’re dealing with. Lingerie models, maybe, but not warriors, especially not if male characters of the same or similar class establish a completely different aesthetic.
~Ozzie
Speaking ofcommunicating a character’s backstory and personality via original design, let’s again celebrate this awesome fanmade Charlottefix that tells us all she would want us to know about her… instead of being just a straight-up bikini armor
With a very few exceptions, pretty much every time I see a game brag about diverse body shapes – I wonder if they hired the same “expert” consultant that Levi’s did:
Since everyone can predict us talking again about Overwatch in the near future, this week’s throwback is the video game industry’s bafflingly narrow definition of what “diversity” among female characters looks like.
So now and again we get people insist that x title shouldn’t be counted because it’s intended to be viewed as porn (especially if that product is from a country outside the English speaking world… because reasons).
Reasons for this assumption often include:
The presence of explicit fan service or sex scenes
The inclusion of ridiculous double standards
Fans having labelled it as an erotic product on their own wikis
The publisher having actual porn products in their catalog
But generally this just assumes that by shoehorning in some sexualized content a product immediately becomes excluded from criticism. Very few products exclude all content from their own genre (plenty of action movies have a romantic subplot for example).
Generally a lot of the cross genre trends have a pretty basic premise behind them, it helps improve the audience investment:
Comic relief in horror and thriller helps avoid the audience becoming desensitized or burnt out from the tension
Having a love interest can humanize a protagonist (or an antagonist) and increase your ability to get invested in them
Mixing a little mystery with your modern fantasy story reminds the audience of how little we really notice or know about the world around us and makes them more accepting to the idea of secret magic
So, what purpose does having ultrasexualized costumes for female characters and regular arbitrary fan service? Well, mostly it’s because of the general belief that certain demographics need a lot of reassurance that some products are okay for them, and in fact made exclusively for them:
That’s not to say that there aren’t products or stories where including sexual content gives it a boost, but generally you’ll want to do it in a way that makes sense and does actually improve the product and that still doesn’t make it porn.
You can physically eat a lot of things, but just as you wouldn’t call it food unless you buy it specifically to eat it, you shouldn’t call it porn unless you buy it specifically for sexual gratification.
– wincenworks
Given the responses to some recent posts, and the recent responses to some old posts, its probably worth bringing this back – particularly since we’re now more or less out of the “slow season” where companies assume everyone is still broke from Christmas shopping.
The general idea that companies should get a free pass for “its just cheesecake” or “that title/genre/etc has always been like that” is essentially a plea to two well and truly exhausted pieces of rhetoric:
If publishers want to produce porn, then they should be confident enough to own that and to try produce good porn.
So now and again we get people insist that x title shouldn’t be counted because it’s intended to be viewed as porn (especially if that product is from a country outside the English speaking world… because reasons).
Reasons for this assumption often include:
The presence of explicit fan service or sex scenes
The inclusion of ridiculous double standards
Fans having labelled it as an erotic product on their own wikis
The publisher having actual porn products in their catalog
But generally this just assumes that by shoehorning in some sexualized content a product immediately becomes excluded from criticism. Very few products exclude all content from their own genre (plenty of action movies have a romantic subplot for example).
Generally a lot of the cross genre trends have a pretty basic premise behind them, it helps improve the audience investment:
Comic relief in horror and thriller helps avoid the audience becoming desensitized or burnt out from the tension
Having a love interest can humanize a protagonist (or an antagonist) and increase your ability to get invested in them
Mixing a little mystery with your modern fantasy story reminds the audience of how little we really notice or know about the world around us and makes them more accepting to the idea of secret magic
So, what purpose does having ultrasexualized costumes for female characters and regular arbitrary fan service? Well, mostly it’s because of the general belief that certain demographics need a lot of reassurance that some products are okay for them, and in fact made exclusively for them:
That’s not to say that there aren’t products or stories where including sexual content gives it a boost, but generally you’ll want to do it in a way that makes sense and does actually improve the product and that still doesn’t make it porn.
You can physically eat a lot of things, but just as you wouldn’t call it food unless you buy it specifically to eat it, you shouldn’t call it porn unless you buy it specifically for sexual gratification.
– wincenworks
Given the responses to some recent posts, and the recent responses to some old posts, its probably worth bringing this back – particularly since we’re now more or less out of the “slow season” where companies assume everyone is still broke from Christmas shopping.
The general idea that companies should get a free pass for “its just cheesecake” or “that title/genre/etc has always been like that” is essentially a plea to two well and truly exhausted pieces of rhetoric:
If publishers want to produce porn, then they should be confident enough to own that and to try produce good porn.
