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Digital Foundry's Alex on Project Eve's main female character: "old (2000's) and not flattering to a Modern Audience...in comparison to...Forespoken"

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bender

What time is it?
Food Comedy GIF by Jo Koy

Martin-Luther-King-on-ignorance.jpg
 

CGiRanger

Banned
What I'm curious about is when exactly does a sexy female design transition into being considered sexist.
Well, if you're asking the people who complain about this sort of thing, it's likely when said design can be described with the attributes:

Attractive
Cute
Hot

And any variant of the above.
 

Omnipunctual Godot

Gold Member
So weird to hear these takes when you've had character designs in recent years such as Nier Automata's 2B and of course Bayonetta. Also have to love the direct comparison to something like Forespoken here.
They're fine with grandfathering in those franchises if it means shutting the door behind them on anything new in the same vein.
 
Modern design simply means covered from head to toe in layers of baggy clothing, short hair with sides shaven, not too feminine, average looks and a frumpy body so no one will be offended. I’m not seeing what the big controversy is about her design. I seen more revealing or sexy attire in the supermarket. They want and expect every female character design to look the same, be boring, grounded and not stand out in any yours.

If character designs like this really bothers so many people, I think they probably have bigger issues than video games. Don’t like a character design in a game, simply don’t support it instead of trying to influence everyone to design and create characters in the same style or the way you create them.
 
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Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
How does he know it's not flattering to a "modern audience"? Where's the data that shows these new preferences that account for a significant portion of the gaming and potential gaming population (since it wouldn't be of interest a research paper polling 70 year-old people, or anyone who only plays mobile stuff)?
It is the modern not so modern “if we all say it is true and we repeat it enough, it will become true”. Influencers trying to influence cultures in their grandiose ways.

Battagli found or think he has found his audience and know what they scream about online so he is “getting with the program”. It is easy to say meaningless word soups such as “not suitable for a modern audience” and get bonus points / protection from the mob.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
It's funny how proponents of diversity are actually in favor of uniformity. Character designs by Korean game developers should not reflect the taste of their country, but of politically correct US/EU game reviewers.
It is ironic of how they are stretching opposition to moral relativism and D&I and not seeing how uniform and colonising their worldview is. Gender neutral language is another interesting thing if you think about how much against cultural appropriation, colonisation, and pro cultural diversity they say they are.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Well I should've said the main character and her presentation in the trailer, ie all the shots lingering on her extremely pronounced ass and pussy and some lovely jiggling titties thrown in.

FFS if people are so blinded by a desperation to oppose any "woke" opinion that they can't admit that that's just blatant objectification (and therefore what most people would consider sexist) then they're just lost as rational human beings.

I'm not outraged by the game/trailer. I found it funny tbh. I wouldn't want to censor it or anything, and I hate all these neo-puritan cunts on Resetera. But I'm honest enough to concede that the design is demeaning.
The design is sexualised, but sexist and demeaning and yet funny? Demeaning to who btw?

I will concede that is very sexualised as a trailer, but I am not sure I would still call it sexist and demeaning. That becomes the neopuritan look on things actually when we start labeling content such as that as demeaning and sexist and what women that shot music videos in similar style as having internalised self hate and misogyny.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
This five hundred percent, I don't have a problem with people having tastes what I have a problem with it is the condescending attitude.
It's not that fucking hard to just go '' this ain't for me '' and move on, you don't need to start going on about '' hurr durr this is outdated and offensive, massively proportions whatevers distasteful and inappropriate ''.

He was clearly referring to her breasts too and I dunno wtf universe he lives in where those are '' massive '' lol.
They're not even that big and even if they were so what?

I find it pretty funny too how these guys talk about how it's distracting etc, like they're just exposing their own misogyny.
If you can't take something or a person seriously because they're attractive then that says a lot more about you than the game or that person.
He's the one sexually objectifying the character.
Obviously the character is attractive and is sexualized, but there is a difference between thinking that and just writing the character off completely as nothing but that.

Which is exactly what he was doing and is the definition of sexual objectification.
And in the end of the day he's a guy sitting in his armchair policing how women dress and how their bodies '' should '' look like etc and he doesn't see how inappropriate that is?
Saying that women being attractive is '' too distracting '' and that you can't take them seriously and acknowledge them beyond that is like misogyny 101, he sounds like an ultra conservative old man.
That shit belongs in Saudi Arabia or something not the developed world.
I wonder if he'd talk to real women that way, the character from Project Eve isn't even that sexualized it was mainly camera angles in the end of the day she mostly just has a skintight bodysuit ( which men in comics have had since forever ).
So I wonder what he thinks about irl women who show cleavage or have any curves..

The type of people who are obsessed with their own identity have a tendency to perceive and reduce other people to simple identities. It's interesting how that discriminating mentality has turned against fictional beings as well.

What I'm curious about is when exactly does a sexy female design transition into being considered sexist. It's obviously okay for people to fantasize and jerk off to imaginary things so the line has to be somewhere in between "someone's imagination" and "commercial product".

Worth requoting! Well put.
 

Vaelka

Member
I’m going to have to agree with Alex. Many Japanese developers are stuck in the stone age with their character design.
Yeah that Thor design sure was the height of originality.

And all the t-shirts and jeans, Western game devs sure are original and very imaginative.

Btw, it's a Korean game studio not Japanese...

I don’t like her design either. It’s just doesn’t fit with the rest of the game.

It's fine not to like it, that's not the issue.
The issue is when people take it five steps further and start throwing accusations at the devs and shaming them and the people who do like it.
If you don't like something it's totally fine there are a lot of things and art directions that I personally find unappealing, the difference is that I don't sit around calling people names or try to get up on some high horse about it and try to turn it into some big issue.

If you don't like something just ignore it and move on.
If Alex had just said '' I am not a fan of the main characters design '' and then moved on and talked about the rest of the game it wouldn't have been an issue at all, the issue is that he took it further.

Personally I find playing characters like these and running around killing monsters to be really appealing, playing what is essentially a pinup girl and killing stuff is just more fun to me than playing a burly dude or dudette.
To each their own, I ain't gonna judge you for what you like judging people over what games they play/ enjoy is just downright silly.
To me the contrast of it all is really fun, it's sorta like with Bayonetta too there's something fun about playing a character like that and killing horrific bible accurate angels.
 
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Hunnybun

Member
The design is sexualised, but sexist and demeaning and yet funny? Demeaning to who btw?

I will concede that is very sexualised as a trailer, but I am not sure I would still call it sexist and demeaning. That becomes the neopuritan look on things actually when we start labeling content such as that as demeaning and sexist and what women that shot music videos in similar style as having internalised self hate and misogyny.

I actually find this thread strangely educational, in that I'm being asked to deconstruct a position that I hold that's just so obvious to me that I probably haven't thought about it much for a while. It's kind of disconcerting to see so many people question how such imagery could be sexist when it just seems self-evident.

To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

I'd thought that civilised people had accepted that a woman presented in a non-sexual context like this - a videogame character whose sex is irrelevant to her role in the game - should be depicted as much as possible as a rounded human being. Instead presenting her as something to be leered at just seems inherently disrespectful to women.

To me it's weird that anyone would question this.

Do you all, for example, reject the idea that the original Lara Croft character model, with her hot pants and gigantic pointy tits, is sexist? Isn't it just *obviously* so?
 
I actually find this thread strangely educational, in that I'm being asked to deconstruct a position that I hold that's just so obvious to me that I probably haven't thought about it much for a while. It's kind of disconcerting to see so many people question how such imagery could be sexist when it just seems self-evident.

To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

I'd thought that civilised people had accepted that a woman presented in a non-sexual context like this - a videogame character whose sex is irrelevant to her role in the game - should be depicted as much as possible as a rounded human being. Instead presenting her as something to be leered at just seems inherently disrespectful to women.

To me it's weird that anyone would question this.

Do you all, for example, reject the idea that the original Lara Croft character model, with her hot pants and gigantic pointy tits, is sexist? Isn't it just *obviously* so?

do you get bothered by roided up bros with muscles in all these games too?

does being attractive mean they have no other features?

would you rather play games with a bunch of ugly fat people instead?

just a ridiculous take
 

Barakov

Member
I actually find this thread strangely educational, in that I'm being asked to deconstruct a position that I hold that's just so obvious to me that I probably haven't thought about it much for a while. It's kind of disconcerting to see so many people question how such imagery could be sexist when it just seems self-evident.

To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

I'd thought that civilised people had accepted that a woman presented in a non-sexual context like this - a videogame character whose sex is irrelevant to her role in the game - should be depicted as much as possible as a rounded human being. Instead presenting her as something to be leered at just seems inherently disrespectful to women.

To me it's weird that anyone would question this.

Do you all, for example, reject the idea that the original Lara Croft character model, with her hot pants and gigantic pointy tits, is sexist? Isn't it just *obviously* so?
GbCXZ4N.png
 

Black_Stride

do not tempt fate do not contrain Wonder Woman's thighs do not do not
Look at this. This is actually beautiful, artful and sexy. This is what these woke assholes want to take away.
I think it look fantastic

d5796994f978e8d916818ed68078fc37a3bb6816.gifv

ae26682371f9962eee81eca9e91ed991d431cdde.gifv

eeb9f2654227151c1258f0556ffdcb579a526a84.gifv

The MC looks like a stock character from Daz, Poser or CC.
But this I guess bad guy actually looks cool.

Do i think its bad...not necessarily but It certainly is a forgettable design.



Tell me this MC doesnt look like she could come from a Genesis 3 pack.
chihiro-g3f-for-genesis-3-f.jpg
 

Hunnybun

Member
do you get bothered by roided up bros with muscles in all these games too?

does being attractive mean they have no other features?

would you rather play games with a bunch of ugly fat people instead?

just a ridiculous take

I don't get bothered by anything, really.

I certainly thought the Gears characters, for example, were pathetically shallow and uninteresting though.

I mean, exactly how outrageously sexualized would a female character have to get before you began to think, hmm, maybe that's a bit much?

What about a game where you play a female solider, and all the male soldiers are in normal fatigues but the woman is is bare-chested, wears a thong, and regularly bends over to expose her labia and anus? Might I be permitted to think that could be a bit sexist?

Or would that be another ridiculous take?
 

MagnesG

Banned
The MC looks like a stock character from Daz, Poser or CC.
But this I guess bad guy actually looks cool.

Do i think its bad...not necessarily but It certainly is a forgettable design.



Tell me this MC doesnt look like she could come from a Genesis 3 pack.
chihiro-g3f-for-genesis-3-f.jpg
It's different, discernable from the get go.

Western being "western" here.
 

Mr Branding

Member
I actually find this thread strangely educational, in that I'm being asked to deconstruct a position that I hold that's just so obvious to me that I probably haven't thought about it much for a while. It's kind of disconcerting to see so many people question how such imagery could be sexist when it just seems self-evident.

To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

I'd thought that civilised people had accepted that a woman presented in a non-sexual context like this - a videogame character whose sex is irrelevant to her role in the game - should be depicted as much as possible as a rounded human being. Instead presenting her as something to be leered at just seems inherently disrespectful to women.

To me it's weird that anyone would question this.

Do you all, for example, reject the idea that the original Lara Croft character model, with her hot pants and gigantic pointy tits, is sexist? Isn't it just *obviously* so?
Bro, it's a game, drop this shtick.
My wife saw this 'controversial and sexist' Eve trailer and literally didn't get what all the fuss is about. She said the alien designs are pretty dope tho.
It's mostly men who act like offended prudes, and I honestly don't fucking get this sort of attitude.
The main character in this game is so tame compared to what I see everyday in the streets, let alone compared to something like Ivy, Bayonetta or 2B.
People will never be satisfied from here on out, we've became too tribal, it's either team right / team left.
All the pr talk about diversity, and yet, here we are, uniforming each and every piece of media to adhere to political interests and views.

Also, what's up with the 'main character design clashes with the setting'?
Why does every original piece of media must be like this or that? That's the creator's vision. Don't like it, don't buy it.

There are a LOT of characters which clash with their environment but ppl have biases and let some fly. I feel 2B is much more jarring in her setting than this.
Also, games are meant to be fun and not everything has to be 'cohesive' or to fit.
If there's an awesome playing game set in the prehistoric, but the mc is a young skateboarder, which in turn opens up a lot of gameplay avenues, so be it.
It's only when x personality or y influencer hypes it up, that it becomes 'oh, lol, so random, love it'.
 

Hunnybun

Member
Bro, it's a game, drop this shtick.
My wife saw this 'controversial and sexist' Eve trailer and literally didn't get what all the fuss is about. She said the alien designs are pretty dope tho.
It's mostly men who act like offended prudes, and I honestly don't fucking get this sort of attitude.
The main character in this game is so tame compared to what I see everyday in the streets, let alone compared to something like Ivy, Bayonetta or 2B.
People will never be satisfied from here on out, we've became too tribal, it's either team right / team left.
All the pr talk about diversity, and yet, here we are, uniforming each and every piece of media to adhere to political interests and views.

Also, what's up with the 'main character design clashes with the setting'?
Why does every original piece of media must be like this or that? That's the creator's vision. Don't like it, don't buy it.

There are a LOT of characters which clash with their environment but ppl have biases and let some fly. I feel 2B is much more jarring in her setting than this.
Also, games are meant to be fun and not everything has to be 'cohesive' or to fit.
If there's an awesome playing game set in the prehistoric, but the mc is a young skateboarder, which in turn opens up a lot of gameplay avenues, so be it.
It's only when x personality or y influencer hypes it up, that it becomes 'oh, lol, so random, love it'.

You're right that everyone has become too tribal and unthinking, but that hardly applies to me, someone who absolutely DETESTS woke culture, or as I used to call it, political correctness.

But that just doesn't stop me from acknowledging that sexism, racism etc exist and are bad.

I don't think this game is bad. It's mildly sexist, in a girly calendar sort of way - to me it's mainly just funny in its lack of subtlety.
 

Arcadialane

Member
I actually find this thread strangely educational, in that I'm being asked to deconstruct a position that I hold that's just so obvious to me that I probably haven't thought about it much for a while. It's kind of disconcerting to see so many people question how such imagery could be sexist when it just seems self-evident.

To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

I'd thought that civilised people had accepted that a woman presented in a non-sexual context like this - a videogame character whose sex is irrelevant to her role in the game - should be depicted as much as possible as a rounded human being. Instead presenting her as something to be leered at just seems inherently disrespectful to women.

To me it's weird that anyone would question this.

Do you all, for example, reject the idea that the original Lara Croft character model, with her hot pants and gigantic pointy tits, is sexist? Isn't it just *obviously* so?
You sound like a robot man, we don't need a committee of progressively programmed robots to tell us a game passes the 'sexism' test before we buy it.
 
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Soosa

Banned
Modern audience = feminazis with blue hair, morbidly obese and more rage than king kong have?

I hope it is more like modern loud minority. Sad that games and movies cant be real fiction, because mentally unstable people cant see the difference between their crazy real life agenda and fiction.
 

Vaelka

Member
To me it's demeaning in the same way that a woman dancing nude for men in a strip club is demeaning, ie *obviously*. It's objectification: the treatment of a person as valuable only in their ability to titillate.

This might come as shock to you, but I can find someone sexually appealing AND acknowledge them as a whole person.
Whenever I hear people say things like this it always makes me wonder if they look at their real life partners in the same way.

Do you no longer respect your partner because you've seen them naked and had sex?
Or other family members that you've seen naked?
Why does seeing someone naked dehumanize them in your eyes? It's a totally arbitrary and self-imposed mindset to have you're really only exposing how you view things.

I can think that 2B's design is sexy ( and cool ) while at the same time finding her a compelling character beyond that too.
If you're incapable of this the problem isn't 2B the problem is you.

The one thing I'd agree with here is that the camera slowmo's were a bit silly but people are mostly bitching about her attire and proportions not the camera. And even then it's still a you problem if you can't take the game and character seriously just because of that it's seriously the most shallow view of it imaginable.
This whole idea that sex and sexuality is demeaning is such a sad mentality to have, and it's definitely not just you even a lot of people on the Conservative side who only defend this game because of the culture war still have that mindset too ( see the extreme hate towards women with Onlyfans or women who do literally anything sexual ).
We're human beings not animals we're supposed to be capable of having more nuanced views and feelings on things like this.
Even characters like Bayonetta actually has more going for her than to ONLY be sexual, even if it's one of her core traits just like dudes being beefy and angry or whatever is it doesn't change that and negate everything else beyond that.

You say what you say, but you're doing exactly what you're complaining about. You're treating the character as only valuable in terms of titillation simply because you found her titillating.
That is actual objectification 101.
 
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Arcadialane

Member
Lol when did I say or even imply we do need that?!


You described it as 'demeaning' and 'sexist' and then said civilised people shouldn't be liking this. You're clearly talking down with disproval and suggesting we should realise all this 'sexism' and also be disapproving.

I wonder if you realise that we indeed understand the point of the games design & aren't really bothered about modern day progressives calling us 'sexist'?
 
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Hunnybun

Member
This might come as shock to you, but I can find someone sexually appealing AND acknowledge them as a whole person.
Whenever I hear people say things like this it always makes me wonder if they look at their real life partners in the same way.

Do you no longer respect your partner because you've seen them naked and had sex?
Or other family members that you've seen naked?
Why does seeing someone naked dehumanize them in your eyes? It's a totally arbitrary and self-imposed mindset to have you're really only exposing how you view things.

I can think that 2B's design is sexy ( and cool ) while at the same time finding her a compelling character beyond that too.
If you're incapable of this the problem isn't 2B the problem is you.

The one thing I'd agree with here is that the camera slowmo's were a bit silly but people are mostly bitching about her attire and proportions not the camera. And even then it's still a you problem if you can't take the game and character seriously just because of that it's seriously the most shallow view of it imaginable.
This whole idea that sex and sexuality is demeaning is such a sad mentality to have, and it's definitely not just you even a lot of people on the Conservative side who only defend this game because of the culture war still have that mindset too ( see the extreme hate towards women with Onlyfans or women who do literally anything sexual ).
We're human beings not animals we're supposed to be capable of having more nuanced views and feelings on things like this.
Even characters like Bayonetta actually has more going for her than to ONLY be sexual, even if it's one of her core traits just like dudes being beefy and angry or whatever is it doesn't change that and negate everything else beyond that.

You say what you say, but you're doing exactly what you're complaining about. You're treating the character as only valuable in terms of titillation simply because you found her titillating.
That is actual objectification 101.

I think a woman dancing nude for men, for money, is degrading. Ditto for masturbating on screen on Onlyfans or whatever.

It's not something I'd want a friend of mine to be doing. Somehow I bet the guys in here wouldn't want it for their sisters, or their mothers. Lol.

That's the basic point. All the gibbering attempts at establishing equivalences between those things and mature, consensual sex, are pure sophistry.
 

Hunnybun

Member
You described it as 'demeaning' and 'sexist' and then said civilised people shouldn't be liking this. You're clearly talking down with disproval and suggesting we should realise all this 'sexism' and also be disapproving.

I wonder if you realise that we indeed understand the point of the games design & aren't really bothered about modern day progressives calling us 'sexist'?

I said it was mildly sexist and thought that civilised people understood that female characters should be more than just their sex appeal.

But I wouldn't go as far as saying the game is "problematic" or anything; I certainly wouldn't want it to be censored; and I mainly just find it funny, as I've repeated about FIVE TIMES now.
 

Lethal01

Member
I think a woman dancing nude for men, for money, is degrading. Ditto for masturbating on screen on Onlyfans or whatever.

It's not something I'd want a friend of mine to be doing. Somehow I bet the guys in here wouldn't want it for their sisters, or their mothers. Lol.

Not at all really. I mean it's obviously not something you'd want to see yourself, just like you don't wanna see your family members banging..

But I'd think of anyone who thought less of my sister or mother for doing porn as a sexist piece of shit... since they are.
 
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Hunnybun

Member
Not at all really. I mean it's obviously not something you'd want to see yourself, just like you don't wanna see your family members banging..

But I'd think of anyone who thought less of my sister or mother for doing porn as a sexist piece of shit... since they are.

You're conflating thinking less of someone because they do something and thinking it would be better for them if they didn't do it.

That makes as much sense as saying you shouldn't want someone not to take heroin because by doing so you necessarily despise them.

It's a transparently bullshit line of reasoning.
 

bender

What time is it?
Quite the contrary. This shows that sexualization of women is 'bad' and thing of the past, but when he gets sexualized (this is not a picture you wish to hand in your living room or school) than it's fine, because... reasons I guess?

Riiiiight. And the insinuation that he is gay as if that were a bad thing?
 

Lethal01

Member
You're conflating thinking less of someone because they do something and thinking it would be better for them if they didn't do it.

That makes as much sense as saying you shouldn't want someone not to take heroin because by doing so you necessarily despise them.

No, I'm saying that they aren't doing something negative and that there's no sexism involved in wanting your game to have some butt shots.
 
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