No one's ignoring the fanservice content, believe me! Our point is simply that the game isn't *all* fanservice. The fanservice is absolutely there -- this is a game designed by a dude who loves boobs more than life itself and isn't ashamed to worship them at every opportunity -- but it's more than JUST that, because Takaki-san is a good enough producer to know that boobs alone aren't going to have lasting appeal. There needs to be something behind the boobs -- personality, charm, identity, spirit, struggle... basically, Takaki-san has taken fanservice to a whole new level, injecting his characters with bombshell bodies AND great personalities.
You don't have to have one or the other. You can have both. And that's really the key here. The Senran Kagura games are sexy as hell... but they've got the substance to match.
If you insist on fanservice games being pure objectification with absolutely nothing beneath the surface, then oddly enough, I'd say the Senran Kagura games are not for you.
-Tom
Wait, I meant that people who don't enjoy porn would have to ignore the erotic component.
But about porn being able to have plot/characters. Yes, it can. That's actually (kinda sorta) my point. I also think that's Official Nintendo Magazine's point. And that's also why I'm at odds with Senran Kagura right now. Because I'm saying yes, it has Campaign Mode and the characters have backstories and personalities, but this isn't enough to vindicate it or absolve it or excuse it from being soft porn. Because porn can have these things. Porn can have story and characters that pop out at you, and still be indulgent and objectifying smut that should be held in the same regard as any other porn. Story and personality don't "unporn" a pornographic work, and that's the issue here. But that's where Senran Kagura and I appear to be at odds. Senran Kagura is supposed to be "more than porn" because it has Campaign Mode and developed characters. I say that's no reason to get high horsed and call yourself "more than porn", Senran Kagura, because that doesn't change anything.
Hatsuu's said this a few times via Tumblr. That Senran Kagura has characters and story, so it's "above" common porn, and that this should be pointed out to potential audiences. But is she saying those potential audiences are people who like ninjas, but don't like soft porn? I don't think that carries. I'm not just saying that my educated opinion is that Senran Kagura might not be the game for someone who doesn't like porn, I think the very idea that the only way something can be objectifying is if it lacks any other quality except sex is... not the way things are done. You can make an erotic cake with all the best ingredients, but you have to look at the purpose of that cake. It's still primarily an erotic cake. You don't go out and try to convince people who don't like erotic cakes to buy one anyway. It's meant to be an erotic cake, by comparison it's specifically NOT meant to a non-erotic cake, and it's meant to cater to those looking specifically for eroticism in their cake. But Hatsuu is protesting that reviewers are calling Senran Kagura an erotic cake, and saying it's not comparable to a normal, non-erotic cake. That's all they've said, but for some reason that's unfair to say. Work done to make a cake taste good is like work done to make a character interesting or a game fun. An erotic cake can still taste good, but we wouldn't be remiss to judge it by its eroticism, right? But Hatsuu is telling me that the only way someone can rightly judge something/someone for being pornographic is if all they have is contextless sexuality. It's not like I think the story and characters and gameplay to Senran Kagura aren't up to code, it's that I disagree with the principle. I don't think a game needs to be a boring, unplayable mess before people can call it porn. It has Campaign Mode and fighting? Of course it does, it's a video game! How is that such an exceptional accomplishment in the soft porn industry? I don't think a game has to be nothing but sexual visuals, barely standing on its own legs as a playable game before people can call it porn. I think that despite character development and a story, at the end of the day it's all still porn, and therefore not for people who don't specifically want porn. That's why I said those who don't like porn would have to ignore the primary purpose, ignore the erotic component. That's why even if Alyx Vance had kept all of her other traits, but got the Senran Kagura treatment, that'd still be bad. No matter how alive or independent of author control they are. Because as it was said earlier in the thread, characters aren't flesh-and-blood people. If you say that a woman's purpose is to be titillating, well that's bad, that's offensive. Even if she's lacking in personality or any other quality. But if you say a character's purpose is to be titillating, you can't call that an insult to theirs or anyone else's integrity unless they actually weren't meant to be titillating. You have to look at the purpose of the character. And if that purpose is to be a sex doll, I don't think it's wrong to call them so. And a sex doll doesn't have to have nothing but sex to be a sex doll.
In fact, a lot of these alleged saving throws for Senran Kagura that make it "more than porn" are not only normal things you could probably take for granted in a game, they're actually common requirements for porn/things where the point is to tittilate the player. It's not really "more" if it's a requirement, which is why I'm surprised at the sentiment. Powerful, entirely female cast? Queen's Blade has been doing that for years and it's
shamelessly soft porn. Because men attracted to women like women, and want to see more women and less men distracting them. It's not necessarily meant to be this empowering thing or meant to appeal to anyone outside of the people lusting after Siggy. And characters with personality? That's no great feat. If your dating sim doesn't have it, it's probably not that great a dating sim. If I'm making "Waifu Simulator 3D Burst Plus", of course I'm giving the girls personalities and backstories. That doesn't mean it's meant to appeal to audiences who aren't in this to fantasize about getting with their moe-moe dream wife, isn't it possible that I did that BECAUSE I wanted players to be able to fantasize about said dream wife? Personality isn't this inherently "deeper than porn" quality. If I mean for it to be, it's nothing BUT a pornographic quality. Hatsuu cites Mirai from Senran Kagura, pointing out how the game eventually explores her motivations for being "a pint-sized Pomeranian who hates being ignored". But you see my point? Without that exploration, she wouldn't BE a pint-sized Pomeranian who hates being ignored. And in this world, that's the kind of character that's worth a lot of interest in the spank bank. If you want to make a cute girl, you have to give her a cute personality. You want to make a slutty girl, you have to give her a slutty personality. You don't give her the personality or explanation or motivations and make her only visuals? The absence of these is not the defining characteristic of porn. The absence of these is not the defining characteristic of "pandering". That's just laziness. Therefore, just because porn isn't lazy doesn't mean people have to hold it above common porn. Porn based around a harem of women to fawn? The girls need personalities the players can fall in love with.
Yes, what I and others are saying is "Obviously the point was to titillate the player." We're not saying there aren't other qualities to the Senran Kagura girls, but we are saying that's the focus, we're saying that's the purpose. Of the game in summary. That it's still porn and all this "substance" isn't meant to be taken as an aside to the porn, it's not meant to be a refresher from the porn, it's not meant to draw in people who don't like porn, it IS the porn. The game is soft porn. If it's not, then we're wrong. But it can't be both. It can't be both porn and anti-porn. Yes, porn can have plot. But what I don't think it should try is turning to the ecchi fan and saying "Yes, this game is for you" but then turning to the fan of tasteful non-offensive characters and saying "Yes, this game is for you." It can't be two games at once, you have to take everything that game is and assign it one title and one title only at the end of the day. If the game is objectively porn, it can't objectively be not porn for someone else. But Hatsuu has admitted to going on the defensive about Senran Kagura, making a point to paint Senran Kagura in a non-pornographic light. That's suicide for porn. Yes, you can point out that your erotic RPG has lots of exploration and that you get to have sex with every NPC but they also have long backstories and deep personalities. But what's suicide is to use those things as a way of saying "Look how unpornographic my porn is!" As a lover of porn, this resonates especially with me. If people are looking for porn, and you're telling them it's not porn, or that they should appreciate it as not porn, they're gonna say "I guess it's not porn" and go look for porn elsewhere. And maybe that's not too horrible to some people, but if you're making porn only to tell people not to take it so pornographically, isn't that contradictory? If I can quote Christopher Monfette's review of the de-porned release of Stagnetti's Revenge, "The logic to a project like this simply doesn't work." These are the mixed signals I've been getting from the Senran Kagura defense. On one end I'm hearing "The ecchi ninja franchise to appeal to man's lust for tits and ass!" On the other end I'm hearing "No, it's not that! If you don't like tits and ass you should still play this game!" It's one game, not two, so just tell us straight up like Ueda told us about Dead Or Alive Paradise. Is the game supposed to be softcore pornography? Or not? And remember, presence of personality doesn't make something "not softcore pornography". You only get that when you remove the softcore pornography. Just because someone might be a fan of dungeon fantasy tales doesn't mean they should read Spunky Knight. And trying to tell fans of dungeon fantasy to read it because "It's totally not what those people who objectify the characters think it is" not only doesn't sell that well because it's clearly porn, but it alienates those of us who wanted some porn, and are now being browbeaten from the high horse about how it's "our problem" if we find the characters sexually objectified.
In summary, I'm saying Senran Kagura shouldn't sell tits and ass to people who don't want it. I'm not saying that's all there is to the game, but I am saying it's softcore porn, and softcore porn has a purpose. If your game is definitely softcore porn, don't try and convince people who aren't into softcore porn that they should still play it and that they're judging it unfairly by passing on it without playing/watching/reading it. Unless Senran Kagura is supposed to be groundbreakingly good, it should be considered that porn has been strictly for being porn since... maybe when video killed the Golden Age of Porn. I don't think it's terrible that a game be made specifically with men in mind, or women in mind, or Japanese men in mind. I wish a game would come forward, I wish an erotic baker would come forward, and say "I make erotic cakes. They are meant to be erotic. Come to my bakery if you want erotic cakes. Do not mistake my cakes for normal cakes, my goal is to make specifically erotic ones and if you don't like erotic cakes, don't come to my bakery." Again, I'm probably biased because I love porn. But if some porn is surrounded by people who don't like porn, that's gonna raise some confusion in the people who came to this party looking for porn. Especially when they read Takaki's Twitter, but then after they've bought, played, and enjoyed the game, suddenly all you hear is that it's not pornographic or indulgent. It's like, what did I just finish playing? I spent
money on this, and I'm not even in my rights to indulge in it???
What is fanservice?
Is it Senran Kagura? Is it oh moe~ moe~ character design? Is it Samara's cleavage? Is it a nude scene in Ghost in the Shell? Is it sexually liberal women in The Witcher? Is it Justin Bieber? Is it topless dudes and bros bro-ing it out? Is it sexual themes?
I feel that we, as a whole, are often too trigger happy to define what fanservice means, especially when confronted with elements foreign to us ( Japanese culture as an example ) and thus immediately shut our eyes from the other perspectives that lie within the full context of what is there compared to others. Or by discerning one medium's fanservice as being more extreme than the other, we disregard other aspects of where fanservice exist.
And in the first, what is wrong with fanservice, especially if it's the creative choice to do so?
You seem to be right on the money, that does appear to be the question of the thread. What "category" does the content in question fall under? Is this supposed to be soft porn? Or is it something innocuous that we're taking the wrong way? Not meant to be soft porn? Is this something you'd watch with your family, or is this one of those shows where it's not too extreme, but you can tell this was made by a group of people sneaking their "interests" into a show where they don't belong?
I like this question. Or at least what I perceive to be the meaning of this question (apparently I have trouble interpreting things the right way). It seems to be suggesting that what people judge to be fanservice depends on a variety of conditions. Like when PdotMichael said that people are thinking that women won't accept or enjoy sexualized content. That's not it. Like Gamerloid said, all sexualized content is not the same. They have different focuses and different purposes. For instance, Sex and the City. The women on that show are sexually frank to the point where their round table discussions are a hallmark of the show. And despite the romantic drama surrounding Carrie's life in the show, I can say as someone who hasn't seen a single episode or ever cared about the show, that said sexual frankness has been met by widespread acclaim, it's seen as non-titillating. If anything, it's a show for women. But even though Senran Kagura is highly sexual, it is not Sex and the City. There's differences that need to be acknowledged.
But if anyone ever feels like something is hardcore sexualization, or isn't hardcore sexualization, and there's debate on that, then I think the question to ask is "If that's not fanservice, then what is? How far does it have to go?" Or, "If that's fanservice, what isn't? How far is it allowed to go while remaining innocuous/appropriate for its safer category?" For instance, sexual themes alone, I personally think, don't necessarily make fanservice. It's possible to have a normal and even sophisticated production be about sexual concepts. Then again, it's also possible and probably more common for a production with sexual themes be for indulgence. Another example maybe, Japanese and American culture both have featured two-piece swimsuits, or barechested muscular men in their works. But Japanese and American culture both seem to be in agreement that barechested men and two-piece swimsuits don't have to be fanservice. You can see them in kids' shows across the board and it's nothing. Then again, that doesn't mean barechested men can't also be 1987's Masters Of The Universe, or Batman & Robin. In other words, maybe there's a difference between Dragon Ball Z, and Free!. And there are bikins in kid's shows that reveal as much as a bikini, but there are also bikinis in Senran Kagura Burst. And I think we're all in agreement that Senran Kagura Burst isn't a kid's game.
As for what's wrong with certain levels of fanservice? Well, people have mentioned many of their reasons in this thread. Some people find it alienating, you hear the term "boys club" thrown around sometimes when people have complaints about the industry. Or objectifying, objectification is rarely a classy thing. Some people even find it destructive, and perpetuating of ideas that they don't think should be perpetuated. I don't think people find it misogynistic or even really all that sexist to flesh and blood human women, but a lot of people don't like the idea of appreciation or support being given to what they believe are negative portrayals. Some people find them plain unlikable, or annoying, or obnoxious. And so like with any other bad trend they see in video games or any other industry, they say "We need less of this, and more of the good stuff."
Or maybe when the fanservice goes too far, people feel like it's not classified properly. Like in Gamerloid's case. Gamerloid disapproves of softcore porn being out in the public with the mainstream games, where people might mistake it for not being softcore porn and buy it. And I gotta hear him out on this, because I've been thinking about this a lot recently. I don't know what to think. Sometimes I hear "Senran Kagura Burst has hardcore sexualization", and then other times I hear "Senran Kagura Burst is rated T for Teen, so it's not that bad." First, I think it should be clarified, Burst didn't just happen to get a Teen rating. Hatsuu went down to the ESRB and talked to them about it. Unless she went down there to convince them to rate it M, but they wouldn't do it, Hatsuu
pushed for a Teen rating. To compare, Senran Kagura Burst is rated D by CERO, and PEGI 16 by PEGI. And all of the DoA Xtreme Beach Volleyball/Paradise games are rated M by the ESRB, D by CERO, and PEGI 16 or equivalent by PEGI, save for DOAX2, which got a PEGI 12 one time. However, its remake, Paradise was rated PEGI 16. And the ESRB
hated Paradise. So I believe that if Hatsuu had not said anything, Burst would've been rated M. It and games like it are rated M everywhere else except in America. Hatsuu pushed for the Teen rating against the ESRB's usual judgement. UNLESS she went down there to say something else. Now, the reason I'm thinking about this so much is because originally Hatsuu was advocating for strong discretion. Via Tumblr, she said Burst was an adult's game. Not for kids. And that her concerns were with the parents and that she believed it was probably the right call for parents to be apprehensive about the Senran Kagura franchise. So if Senran Kagura is an adult's game, why
push for the Teen rating? Why not just let it be rated M? I'm having trouble understanding, it just seems incongruous to speak out so strongly for treating Senran Kagura as an adult game and treading lightly, but then later on speaking out strongly for how apparently safe it is. It's like I was saying before, Sometimes I hear one thing, other times I hear another thing. Other people I've talked to about this say that the ESRB was probably lenient because it's an eShop release in America, not retail. So you don't run the risk of a kid walking into a store and buying it with their own money and voila, Junior just found two great reasons to turn on the 3D. That's why we have M ratings, so Gamestop will say "No, you can't have this, you're just a kid." Games that aren't for kids should have some kind of protection that parents can rely on. Is the eShop that? If M ratings keep kids from walking into a store and buying games that aren't for them, does the eShop somehow prevent kids from buying Senran Kaguras 1 and 2? I don't think it does. Because if you give kids eShop points, they can buy games on their own at the eShop. Just like if you give kids cash, they can buy games on their own at Gamestop or Best Buy or whatever. Now, like with Gamestop and Best Buy, you can impose a "No M-rated titles" policy with the eShop. I think you can restrict any ESRB rating, actually. Mature titles, Teen titles, and so on. But parents are likely to block Mature titles. Not Teen titles. That's why Gamestop and Best Buy have the policy. Mature titles aren't for kids. But Teen titles? Sure, go ahead kid, happy birthday. A parent probably wouldn't think to block Teen titles unless they had a particularly young kid. But then Senran Kagura comes along, sneaking past the radar because it's rated Teen. As though it were a game acceptable for kids. I don't wanna get sensationalist media on anyone, but is it not possible for Little Suzy to get her allowance of eShop points from her mom, go looking through the eShop, see Senran Kagura, see the pics, read that "borderline false advertising" tagline, think "Wow, an all-girls game, this sounds like the game for me", buy it, and play it, without her mom having to consent to any of that? The only way to prevent that is to either look over your kid's shoulder every time they boot up their 3DS, or restrict all Teen rated games, and unlike Mature games, Teen is supposed to be a lot more acceptable. Senran Kagura has more or less foiled the radar system that parents were supposed to trust, and if you're on parents' side with this, and believe Senran Kagura isn't for kids or teenagers, why effectively put a sticker on it that says it's for kids and teenagers?
EDIT: Hatsuu actually came by and explained that all she did was fill out the usual requisite form, there was a question about asses that required a little clarification, and after reviewing the evidence the ESRB was apparently happy to give Burst the Teen rating.
Why so ready to give Burst the Teen rating when they were out for Team Ninja's head for Paradise? Becaue there weren't enough exposed buttocks, I guess? I dunno, I wasn't there. But apparently this snafu all falls on the ESRB, not Hatsuu.
