Ah, Gloria… What in the Nine Hells is even going on.
Gloria here is from Devil May Cry 4, where she is a high-ranking soldier. Yes, you read that right. She even demonstrates her “acrobatic and combat skills” in the game, to even the horror of VergilNero*, the main character. Watch the video at your own risk, not in public if possible.
For those who don’t want to scar their eyes and brains, here’s instead a picture of what the back of her “outfit” looks like:
In case you thought that the front of her could not be outdone.
-Icy
* The series really needs to consider in giving male leads distinct appearances or unique personalities… or maybe just personalities at all.
Cool for the Summer Skins (NSFW)
Our first (and definitely not last) foray into redrawing Overwatch. Their summer 2017 skins were a strange mix of bland and safe, cosplay, and a single actually good idea (grill dad 76). We decided that wouldn’t do, and so picked two of the more unsatisfactory skins in the collection to redesign and actually have some fun with!
Widowmaker
When I first saw Widow’s boring, predictable summer skin, I was mildly annoyed. But after giving it some thought, I became hugely disappointed that they didn’t make her into a fisherman! The fishing rod that looks like a sniper rifle? She even has a grappling hook that could be made to look like she’s throwing a fishing line. What a missed opportunity.
So I made try-explaining-those-tanlines Widow into fishing-day Widow, complete with plaid shirt and huge rubber boots. Because her legs are so fricking long, I should probably have given her hip waders, which are rubber boots that go up to your thighs or higher. They’re actually appropriate thigh-high boots, for once! Given more time, I could have also given her more accessories on her belt, like a bunch of lures and containers with bait.
This is one of those ideas that I may come back to and actually design properly
in the future.
-Icy
Mercy
I found the “Nike” Mercy skin utterly uninteresting and kinda overdesigned. to fight that, I changed her tunic to have a shorter “tabbard”, expose one breast (because why not?) and cover up more of her butt.
Got rid of those sandals with weird, borderline impossible to wear straps, and replaced them with winged Nike sneakers.
And to make more serious attempt at portraying her as Nike, the goddess of victory, I put the laurel in her hand, instead of head, which is this mythical figure’s most basic attribute, right after the wings. And one more in her mouth, to make her more cheeky.
~Ozzie
@fingersareoptional replied to your post“I’ll be done with my damn term paper later today. So… What armor needs…”
Athena from Smite! All she’s wearing is some kind of dress thing with boob plates stuck to it somehow? Anyways, a goddess of war deserves more.
I don’t know what that tiddy armor is even supposed to protect. I was tempted to fix the amazon armor but honestly that would work better with Artemis than Athena.
I never played Smite so I hope I got it right!
We had some technical difficulties with our stream this weekend, fret not! We got a great SMITE goddess redesign right now.
This really is a lovely armor fix that actually uses the original’s shapes and motifs effectively! I like the breastplate and collar in particular. The headgear looks better as well, and I’m so glad her WoW-esque pauldron got shrunk to a reasonable size.
The only change I would make is to either give her a white tabbard or something else under the belt, just to break up the 2 different browns.
Even though we’ve featured @enecola on the blog before, I will continue to recommend that you check out their blog for more cool redesigns and original character designs~
-Icy
The Laura Croft game we all deserve
It’s 5am and my eyes were so blurry that I legit thought “wow look at Shia LaBuff”
I love the smell of male empowerment in the morning
As our previous reblogs prove, empowered male equivalents to Lara Croft are always welcome on BABD!
~Ozzie
h/t: Way too many loyal BABD readers to count! Thank you all for the heads up!
In case anyone forgot that Paladins comes from the same developer as SMITE (if you couldn’t tell by their absolutely “creative” designs), here’s original costume of Furia, one of their newest champions.
Somehow even people at HiRez concluded that visible panties and completely out-of place garter belts are too ridiculous combination, because apparently after some fan feedback she received a slight redesign that includes pants under those garters.
Fret not, perverts! Her original look is preserved through red recolor “Iron Maiden” skin!
And just in case you wondered whether some actually creative designs got discarded during Furia’s development, don’t worry! No matter how many revisions she went through, there was always at least one “beloved” Female Armor Bingo element in there, like boobplate, cleavage/boob window or otherwise uncovered skin!
~Ozzie
h/t: @randomrobin
SMITE-ing Masculine Beauty!
After League of Legends, where we fixed Jarvan and Azir, our next dude-sexyfying endeavor layed in the land of gods, double standards and shameless racism that is SMITE.
Poseidon
Not gonna lie, after all the effort I put into Arhian, I picked an easy male material to work of. I used this official Poseidon design found on Hi-Rez’s artist’s ArtStation as a base. His left pec, abs and obliques were lovingly rendered already, so I made it my task to show off more of his muscular godly body. No big changes about his physique were needed, the costume and Poseidon’s attitude is what called for some modification.
What I landed on outfit-wise was, appropriately enough for the lord of the oceans, a mankini. Made out of metal and gemstones.
The idea (which, I believe, Icy or some stream watcher might have suggested) was pretty brilliant solution to showcase more bare flesh while keeping the water theme.
His weirdly low-hanging belt buckle became a decorative codpiece. Gemstones and decorative spikes accentuate the nipples.
Also I replaced strategic butt covering in his cape into a strategic butt display. Obviously, god of the sea has perfectly shaped and shiny bubble buttocks.
Last, small but crucial change was his expression. From an angry god who will kill you for looking at him wrong into a loving, kissable daddy.
Soft Poseidon cares about you.
~Ozzie
Vulcan
I wasn’t lucky enough to find a high-rez picture of Vulcan, but I decided to do the hot volcano-dwelling smithing god anyway. I removed most of his clothes, leaving only hotpants (for the hot god ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)) and a little bit of apron. It’s not like he needs protection from the furnace, he’s a god, after all. I gave him more of a wrestler body, since he’s a smith, as well as a nipple-framing suspender. But just the one.
I also made his prosthetic rounder, to match his soft, round body.
As for his face, I gave him a big, soft beard, a shy pout, and a long, smooth undercut suggested by someone during the stream (sorry I can’t remember who!). And the final touch was, of course, the curly hair on his chest and leg.
Now Vulcan is truly warm and welcoming.
-Icy
The Monster Hunter series has been a mixed bag when it comes to armor design, and as we’ve shown before, Monster Hunter World has proudly followed in that tradition. We’ve seen that they can do actual armor for both the men and women characters, so what the fresh hell is this? This is high level armor, too. This is what the male version looks like, by the way:
I guess I’m impressed that the characters can hand-mold monster carapaces into boob cups?
-Icy
Kanpani Girlfriends
When we discovered that Kanpani Girls is a perfect candidate for our Wall of Shame, we dug through their massive library of really badly designed waifus and picked some relatively easy fixes. Reading up their bios, our choice were two Holy Knight friends, Flavie and Marica, whose defining characteristic is being self conscious about being too short and too tall, respectively.
Liking the cute dynamic of them both helping overcome one another’s complexes, we decided our versions should be girlfriends.
Well, the obvious first thing to go was that single-breasted boob plate, which was a…. unique design, I guess? I instead changed it to a design I saw when looking up armor references for my OCs.
I gave her Elizabethan poofy pants because everyone should wear them, honestly. I decided to go for an overall brown and cream color scheme, but left in the red and added some blue to tie the colors in with Marica’s red and blue details, since they are girlfriends. The flame on her tabbard comes from her element in the game, which is fire. Her design is basically all large and medium-sized shapes, so I wanted to add something small. It’s hard to see, but I also gave her a cream-colored sleeve on her left arm. Finally, I adjusted the scarf shapes to look better, both around her neck and as it blows in the wind.
Even though the final redraw is fairly simple, it was definitely fun to work on. I ended up trying like 3 different pants shapes for her before I settled on these. Cell shading is definitely not my thing, though.
-Icy
It was one of those designs that’s very close to working as a stylized girly armor, but doesn’t, because someone HAD to give her big ol’ cleavage and exposed thighs. So, my aim was to bring back its potential.
I’m quite happy with how the breastplate shape came out, with its high curve and slightly bigger tassets. First I intended to incorporate that leather cincher into it, but it just didn’t work. I also gave her semi-poofy pants with diagonal pattern similar the absurd shape of her original thigh-baring stockings.
Another thing was to make her shoes at least a tiny bit flatter and more planted on ground, considering the original artist drew her as if she was floating in air rather than supporting her own weight on her feet. High heels not only are universally stupid footwear for a knight, but Marica is supposed to dislike being tall! Why would she wear shoes that add to her height?
Finishing touches were to establish her better as the girlish one of the couple (big part of her and Flavie’s actual bios) by making her red ribbon/bow motif more significant, especially with hair bow that nicely contrasts with her blue locks (inspired largely by the ending of one of my favorite anime). Also last minute change: decorative piece on her halberd is now red too, to tie everything together.
Bonus point that red accents connect her to Flavie 🙂
If I were to do it today, I’d also turn her skirt and collar into the same graphite color as her armor joints and dark part of her pants, so that they wouldn’t blend into her blue hair.
All in all, not my best or most complex rework (I also had big trouble with cel shading style, obviously), but I think it goes to show how small changes can make a difference between gratuitous sexualization and cute girlishness.
~Ozzie