This week we are streaming one hour later than usual! Which means we’ll be starting on Saturday at 11:30 AM PT / 8:30 PM CEST. This isn’t a new schedule, just for this one week!
Personally I am one hundred percent supportive of orcs being allowed to feel pretty whenever they want. I don’t understand the final panel, surely it should be full of celebration!
While the sexy Hawkeye and Manfire blogs are largely archival (and marked NSFW, because Tumblr is a hellsite) these days, there’s always @magicmeatmarch every year 🙂
this is all fun and games folks, don’t get upsetti!
a while back, @bikiniarmorbattledamage reblogged my pink-overhaul doomguy illustration, and they’ve been on my radar ever since. I’ve always wanted to try my hand at a redesign, and one of their newer posts caught my eye!
Angela, from the game Trials of Mana, has so many awesome motifs in her design, and she’s absolutely adorable. I wanted to keep a lot of that, but also cover up them lovely legs and put the cloak in it’s rightful place, making her seem more like a magician from a colder place, rather than an attractive swimsuit model.
I took a lot of inspiration from Alena from the Dragon Quest series with this design, especially with the hat. It was so tiny on her original design, so I gave it a little growth spurt.
I think the biggest change I implemented for this design was her dress. I kept the slim waist, because hey, it’s cute as hell, but I added a lovely skirt that mimicked the design of her hat and her cape, which was rightfully relocated to her shoulders.
I really hope words can contain how impressive this redesign is, @mintyeggs! You brought out all the potential poor Angela had that Trials of Mana’s artists refused to take the advantage of! I especially like changing the butt cape into a regular cape while maintaining all the shapes where they belong. Also a big fan of the tunic you designed for her from scratch.
If there’s one thing I’d reconsider, it would be whether the inside of the cape’s color blends too much with her hair (maybe the lining should be dark
at the top
like her pants?), but that’s really a minor nitpick.
~Ozzie
Ohh, I absolutely love what you did with the shirt! I didn’t even notice those cuff things on her wrists until I looked at your redesign and saw that you turned them into a blouse. Well done! She definitely looks more like a magician now, and she won’t be freezing her buns off in her own house. And you still maintained the shape language and color scheme, too, what an inspiration for our own future redesigns.
To be completely honest, Summoners War probably has way worse cases of terrible female armor if you go through their monster collection, but what’s worse about this one is that she is the reward for getting through the second scenario area of the game, which means EVERYONE has her, so you have to see this monstrosity all the time.
I always feel so weird about the clash of chibi AND “sexy” aesthetic. Trying to have a cake and eat it too. There’s really not much to add about the costume itself, other than this being too painfully generic to even register. BUT it did strike a rare diagonal bingo, so congrats to Summoners War, I guess? I am sorry for all the players who are subjected to multiple copies of this running around inside the game.
This week we’re continuing our work on Cassandra. Did her namesake foresee how awful a character with her name would look in later Soul Calibur games? ?
Slightly different link up above, but still the same multi-stream experience. Join us at our regular BABD time on Saturday at 10:30 AM PT / 7:30 PM CEST.
So remember the outcry that somehow a zoom in shot of Rainbow Mika (R. Mika)’s butt slap was so critical to the game that it’s remove was an act of vile censorship? Well we now have the official word from the Street Fighter team on what led to that memorable day:
“We didn’t make any change because of external influences,” he says. “Those changes came up internally. We decided to remove that because we want the biggest possible number of people to play, and we don’t want to have something in the game that might make someone uncomfortable.”
The even better news is that those who were enraged that such an amazing act of censorship could occur have pretty much re-affirmed the point. After a month and a lot of publicity, the petition only gathered 6,300 signatures (and at least one duplicate I noticed). Most of these guys still don’t seem to believe that the developers actually decided on this change on their own…
and they’re probably all going to buy the game anyway:
I can’t imagine why the developers may choose to try to appeal to people outside of this demographic… oh wait, I can.
– wincenworks
Today’s throwback: reminder that “self-censorship” isn’t really a thing and maybe a developer doing the bare minimum to not alienate potential audience pre-release is neither “pandering to the SJWs” nor literally a vile act of censorship? ?
I went into redesigning this with no idea who that character is supposed to be, and frankly, looking her up now, can’t say I’ve missed much back then.
Can you believe she’s supposed to be a Valkyrie? Judging by her (and her sister’s, Griselda’s) design, Gwendolyn looks more like a really weird mashup of Odette/Odile from Swan Lake and lingerie model with random armor bits on legs… plus the ass wings. Call me weird, but I never got the idea of putting wings on humanoid characters’ butts/hips/lower back instead of shoulders. It’s not like regular laws of physics apply either way, but this seems like a much less uncomfortable way to fly than with the upper back.
Of course, first thing I did was move the wings to more conventional position, then copypasting her a brand new left arm, it fitted surpirisingly well.
I kept the changes to the outfit to a minimum, giving her tights and expanding her frilly top, so that it doesn’t slip off her chest (both in matching yellow/gold). Also got her some pauldrons (edited from the armor on her thighs) and recreated from scratch a bit of her dress that was hidden behind the ass wing (quite happy with how I painted it). Another minor detail was changing her left shoe’s shape into something that doesn’t require foot liquification.
Much less radical redraw than Icy’s excellent Velvet (who’s apparently Gwen’s half-sister), but I hope you guys like it!
As you are doubtlessly aware – there is currently a lot going on in the United States of America. On top of a national struggle with the Covid-19, the fallout from the senseless murder of George Floyd has led to police attacking protesters, journalists and innocent bystanders throughout the nation. There have been violence, arson a lot of questionable reporting by major outlets.
The violence and mistreatment that black people in the USA are subjected to daily is appalling, and responses from those in positions of power and authority are unconscionable. Our hearts go out to those who are protesting and those who are simply trying to get by in a world where police respond to protests against police brutality are met with more police brutality.
If you’re far from the protests and feeling helpless, there are some things you may be able to do to help:
Amplify black voices when you see them speaking on the matter
Donate to organizations that are helping protesters directly (list below)
Actively look into what is going on and educate yourself through resources people are making freely available
Do share what you learn with non-black friends, family and communities
If you are not black, please do not:
Ask black people to explain things to you or tell you what you can do to help, there are a lot of people volunteering the information now
