Sexually provocative armor for male characters is very important.
I know it seems kind of like “but what about THE MEN” and it can definitely end up being that when a discussion about female armor gets derailed by people jumping in and going “yeah but dudes in skimpy armor!!” and discussing that at length. That’s not appropriate to do, but as its own topic it’s really important.
The one thing that made TERA playable for me (however briefly) is that whoever designed the armor made some very deliberate design decisions on several of the male pieces—especially on Castanic males—that emphasized sexual attractiveness in a way that was equivalent to the female armor. The game was not in any way “equal,” no matter what anyone might try to argue: Having ten or so armor sets for two races that show skin provocatively on male characters does not make up for nearly every single armor set on every single female character doing the same thing. But it was something, and it was the one thing that made the game feel like it might on some level be attempting to appeal to more than just straight guys.
Even the addition of *~options~* in games where there are a few or (rarely) a roughly equal number of non-sexualized female armor sets isn’t necessarily any better. Making sets intended to be sexually appealing on one character gender and not doing the same for the other still privileges the comfort level and interests of straight male players. If having *~options~* isn’t good enough to raise their comfort level, then why should it be considered good enough for everyone else?
If you’re willing to put provocative male armor in your game, you send an important message. If sexy armor is so fun and harmless and fantasy and artistic and aesthetic and ect., then stand by that statement you insist on making and design the equivalent for male characters. I’m not talking about showing a few square inches of chest, I mean clothes that are designed equivalent to female sexy armor. Cut swathes out of it to show off their thighs and hips. Make it form-fitting and flattering to the shape, regardless of how practical it is. Highlight the character’s physical vulnerabilities—and don’t balk, that’s what 90% of sexualized female armor does. There’s a reason that shit looks like lingerie, so don’t make a couple of Conan the Barbarian sets and claim you’ve done the same thing for guys. Put a freaking peekaboo window on the small of their back right above their ass, give them a crop top. You know, the usual.
And some men will protest, and they’ll get upset. You should do it anyway, because if the discomfort of one group of your players isn’t enough to stop you, it shouldn’t be enough in this case, either. Adding the occasional set of practical, non-sexualized armor for female characters doesn’t constitute equality when so many of the others are Fredrick’s of Hollywood surprise grab bags for female characters only.
Well said. Bolded for emphasis.
~Ozzie
..my move is just awful, it’s chauvinist! Every time I fall over my vagina and vulva is exposed. I might as well be an NPC that doesn’t know where to wander!
Felicia Day, playing as Tyris Flare in the original Golden Axe game, (x)
Golden Axe, the iconic side-scrolling hack’em up is also a pretty iconic example of bikini armor:
And yes, Dolph LundgrenAx Battler (that is his actual name!) is wearing a bikini too but as well as being a male power fantasy (or someone I’d expect to see featured at videogamesmademegay) he always looks badass posed like Conan the Barbarian or a classical mythological figure. He also quickly got an unsuccessful spinoff game and you had the option to play a dwarf who at least kept his shirt on.
Tyris on the other hand, despite having a much less ridiculous name, had to wait until 2008 when she would get to be the star. But hey, that’s like eighteen/nineteen years of social and artistic progress right? Let’s see how they portrayed her and promoted the game!
Yeah…
– wincenworks
A note about Female Armor Bingo Sundays
We have previously updated some bingos after they have been posted, however we will not be doing this unless there is an important reason.
Here’s why:
- Female Armor Bingo is intended as a fun way to encourage critique of popular media and thus draw attention to troubling tropes. Too much pressure to make every bingo perfect takes away the fun and derails the conversation away from the intended purpose.
- Many of the terms are deliberately vague so as to cover the many forms the trope takes and thus it can become very subjective.
Nitpicking over details again derails and also encourages the mentality that “No one can criticize you for x, provided you do y.” - When people submit bingo cards to us, they’re marking off the points they see – if they miss a point or two on a card that’s already over half full then it doesn’t really diminish from the core point: The armor is disrespectful to women in general and part of a prevalent and harmful trope.
- Sadly, Female Armor Bingo is not an empirical measuring device – we’ve had absurdly objectifying outfits that didn’t score bingos either due to technicalities or how the squares happened to be filled out. They were still objectifying and deserving ridicule.
Just like the famous Bechdel Test, the bingo is supposed to shed light on a bigger trend in popculture, not to meticulously analyze who and what “passes”. - Finding new content for the blog, checking submissions, researching and writing posts, etc. is time consuming and a much higher priority than tweaking bingos that are already entertaining and on-point.
While it’s great fun to joke about the exact score and keep a tally of the highest scoring bingos it’s not essential for every bingo to be 100% accurate and correct.
So from now on we’ll be limiting edits after posting to important and noteworthy events – like that time we discover that against all odds, Fran’s outfit was worse than we dreamed.
~Ozzie & – wincenworks
