This is truly fantastic not only for the authentic touch of the culture, but also for the excellent choice of a dancer outfit for a character who has elegant dancing sequences as her emotes. This is really the sort of thing I’d hope to see in a game as touted for diversity as Overwatch is.
I really do wish that Jeff Kaplan would look to these kinds of designs and priorities for his goal of “trying to do women characters better” rather than looking for ways to make their previous design standards seem more acceptable under casual examination.
– wincenworks
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This design comes from a game about Norse mythology. I challenge you, our readers, to take a guess at which character from Norse mythology this is. I’ll wait.
Did you say Hel, who is the villain of the game Viking: Battle for Asgard? If you did, you must have read our post about Foldable HumanDan Olson looking into So Bad They’re Good games from a few months back. Because that awfully specific answer is indeed correct…. unfortunately.
I can’t even comprehend what the art direction was for this concept. What in the Hel (ha) is this? I was only able to find this single promo picture where the full glory of this design is shown, which I can only assume is because if she stands in any other way, that belt bra will slip off.
But let’s also not forget Freya, who also makes an appearance in the game!
So whenever i would watch movies and see The Badass Female Character fighting in various ways, something about it always bugged me. I just assumed it was internalized misogyny that made me dislike characters like black widow and Tauriel and tried to make myself like them.
Then I was rewatching Mad Max Fury Road the other day and I noticed that nothing bothered me about watching Furiosa fight and I realized the problem wasn’t watching women fight in movies that got on my nerves.
Watching the stereotypical Badass Female Character she always has these effortless moves and a cocky, sexy smirk on her face as everything is easy. Watching Furiosa, she grunted and bared her teeth. Her fighting was hard and it took effort and it hurt like fighting is supposed to. For once her fighting style wasn’t supposed to seduce the audience it was to be effective.
I wasn’t disliking these characters because they were women I was disliking that their fighting was meant to remind me they were women. High heels and shapely outfits and not showing effort or discomfort because it’s more attractive to effortlessly lift a long leather clad leg over your head rather than rugby tackle someone.
It’s the same with the Wonder Woman movie too. Fighting is hard and it takes effort, blocking bombs and bullets with a shield makes her grimace and bare her teeth with the effort it takes. She’s not flip kicking bombs she’s yelling and straining, not because she’s weak or bad at fighting but because that’s what it would be like.
I really hope we’re moving into an era of women having fighting styles designed for realism and not how hot it looks for the men in the audience.
We as well hope that more media gets away from those tropes and starts portraying women fighters as just that – people who fight, with no pretense that their precious femininity needs to be preserved at all times. Especially when male characters are treated completely seriously.
Every year, Hanzo bypasses the bodyguards of Hanamura to visit Shimada Castle, employing all manner of tactics, combat, and costumes.
Storm Arrows take the shape of rabbits.
Dragonstrike is now Rabbitstrike.
There isn’t a single thing I don’t love about this concept: The quiver that’s too short because it’s ~magic~, the tattoo going up his entire leg, the raw magic bow, the little mask.
We all know that Hanzo is a ranged combatant, so he doesn’t need to wear actual protective clothing. Indeed, those shoes probably help him be stealthier! And if someone does find him and tries to initiate in melee, he’s got the distraction tactic all ready to go with those buns. It’s perfect.
Blizzard really missed a golden opportunity with the magician skin idea. I am conflicted about one thing though…. which skin of the bottom 3 is my favorite!! How am I supposed to choose?
Because fictional characters do not have the capacity to make choices. Because they are not REAL people.
Power Girl and Starfire did not CHOOSE to fight evil in skimpy, revealing outfits. It is not their PERSONAL CHOICE to wear those clothes. They are fictional characters and their wardrobes are under the control of the author and artist.
Dumbledore did not CHOOSE to stay in the closet as a personal and professional choice because that was his right as a person. He is a fictional character. The fact that his sexuality was left at only vague subtext and only revealed through word of god was a deliberate decision made by the author.
Fictional characters are fictional characters. They do not make their own choices.
Addendum to the rule: for the same reasons, you can not argue that criticism “shames” a character for their appearance or behavior.
And just for the record, seeing what kind of responses this post received before we got to reblog it: NO, the fact that fictional characters tend to grow and take a life of their own still does not mean they have agency.
No matter how developed a fictional person is, they’re still written by a real person (or people) who have their own biases and rationalizations. Just because some “choices” feel natural to the author doesn’t mean they’re objectively plausible “choices” for a character to make within the given narrative.
Sometimes the choice, like (in case of what our blog critiques) decision to wear a sexualized costume to battle, can be explained by specific circumstances. But in most circumstances or with other explanations, the same choice can be plain silly and inconsistent with the rest of established story/worldbuilding.
This week’s throwback: a timely reminder that yes, we still live in a world where fiction doesn’t merge with the reality, so no, fictional characters do not possess free will that lets them personally decide what to wear and how to behave.
Each and every “choice” a character makes is 100% responsibility of their real, living creator(s). Thus criticizing how fictional people are designed or written isn’t the same as personally attacking them. To cite @foldablehuman‘s Thermian Argument video:
Criticism of a creative work is, ultimately, criticism of the decisions that people made when they were putting it together.
Essentially, there’s no point in getting offended on behalf of a person who doesn’t exist, especially in response to valid critique.
~Ozzie
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Starfire and the Legend of Murky Colors
Injustice 2′sStarfire was a challenge with very little potential, so I mostly redid her from scratch, arriving at a mix of her 2000s cartoon outfit and 80s comics hair.
This was by far the hardest design to work with palette-wise, considering not only how desaturated colors in Injustice graphics are, but how outright low quality the official image is – it looks like something’s wrong with how they rendered the lightning! Muted colors were a double insult, considering Starfire’s vibrant color scheme corresponds with her vibrant personality. Did my best to recreate it by cranking up saturation, salvaging the few colors it did bring out and painting over the badly-lit parts with them.
Changed her bodypaint-bikini into a crop top and shorts (with all do respect to Glen Murakami’s cartoon Starfire design, flying in a skirt is just the worst idea).
Only part of her Injustice design worth salvaging were decorative bits on her belt, which I recolored silver and recreated the pattern on her new collar and arm guards to match. Painted her limp, lifeless hair to actually look fiery without even being made of flame – by simply basing them on her original New Teen Titans hairstyle.
Got rid of those weird bellbottom things on her ankles, which served no purpose and seemed like a throwback to her ugly New 52 footwear. Also, as usual, made her less skinny.
All in all not necessarily my best or most original redesign, but it’s best I could do with limited time, constant computer crashes and very hard material to work off of.
And on today’s episode of Doing Women Better™, Blizzard finally granted us the much requested Magician Symmetra. Only instead of going for something super classy like the many fan interpretations out there or even just ladies in suits from real life, they went with…this.
Lack of pants and framing her bust (what is even with those metal plates) aside, the fact that this is a legendary skin and costs 3000 credits when it’s so close to her default skin makes this whole thing very disappointing.
Thanks for submitting this highly requested post, including some quality scathing commentary! The Saga of Pantless Symmetra continues.
This would be insulting enough just by the virtue of being a fetishy leotard instead of a suit, but what the hell are those boob-holder bars?! They’re some sort of garbage afterthought slapped on to make this look more “sci-fi”, I guess? Why would a costume need that? Because you can’t be science fiction without framing the tits with random pieces of metal?
Since the bingo lacks a “What the fuck am I looking at?!” square, I marked “Boobplate” instead.
Fun fact: a convention I attended last week had an Overwatch: Character design done right! talk that I just couldn’t subject myself to come to, both out of the fear of my brain melting on sight and because I didn’t want to rain on some enthusiastic fan’s parade when the time for Q&A comes.
I’m still amused that at the same time Blizzard made THIS, easily disproving the “character designdone right” claim.
Gotta love the “creativity” of web ads presenting just another grizzled military dude as an equivalent to a generic pretty girl with long flowing hair, cleavage and belly out. Totally legit and “equal” soldier designs! Especially for a game that apparently takes place during WW2?
Um, is that supposed to be some sort of parallel universe? Because other than USSR imagery slapped on like an afterthought, even the guy doesn’t look anything close to a soldier from the 1940s…
