Male Viera as a playable character! show your support

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Originally Posted by manickitty

Lore doesn’t need to be changed. It’s just the vocal minority using it as an excuse when it’s a debunked reason.

Miqote males are just as rare as viera yet there are thousands running around. Ronso females are absolutely a thing.

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Miqote males are an original concept from FF14, Vieras aren't, that's the biggest difference. FF14 can retcon FF14 all they want, not FFT and FF12.
Also they didn't call them Ronsos for a reason : they aren't ronsos.
And finally, needless to say, but "muh vocal minority" isn't an argument. In the sea of people who don't give a damn, you're also part of a "vocal minority".

Miqote are just repainted Mithra though, and they, like the Viera, where genderlocked. Ungenderlocking the Viera for FFXIV would be no different from what happened with the Miqote.

Please add Male Viera and Female Hrothgar. I have no plans on playing them myself but I wish to support those who do.

I fully understand that having 2 full races in one expansion is a lot of work and why you thought it'd be a great surprise to provide 2 races at the cost of gender since no new race was added for Stormblood.
Therefore I will fully understand if removing the gender lock means having to wait until 6.0.

While i was never a fan or saw the need of adding Viera. I was actually curious to maybe try to play as a male viera on an alt to see how it would work. Not that im dissapointed but im still scratching my head ( despite the explination ) as to why of all things we got a second cat race in return. The more support the more probably both genders come in 6.0 tho. Never too early

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Originally Posted by HealerMagi

Miqote are just repainted Mithra though, and they, like the Viera, where genderlocked. Ungenderlocking the Viera for FFXIV would be no different from what happened with the Miqote.

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Don't forget Roegadyns... they're repainted Galkas! :O Can say the same about Humes from FFXI.

Showing support for male Viera!

I agree. Not only do I like the look of male viera in concept art, but I believe that genderlocking these two races so that the only new options in this expansion are sexualized bunny girls and strong beast men reinforces harmful and regressive stereotypes about gender. Please remove the lock to provide options to your playerbase and show you do not support such tropes. I understand if you cannot do so immediately due to limited resources, but affirming your commitment to doing so eventually would mean a lot to me and many other players. Thank you.

As someone who has long been vocal against gender restrictions for the gear we wear in-game, I am of course very supportive of adding both male Viera and female Hrothgar in a future update. The lore is not some immutable fact of real world history, and I'm confident the team has the skill to write male Viera in a way that would satisfy players.

As a person who plays a female Roegadyn, I am keenly aware of how the team decided it was in everyone's best interest to not restrict a race to one gender during the development of 2.0. The fact that there were no gender-restricted races in the game upon launch was a selling point to me back in 2013. Six years later, this seems like a leap backward.

I sympathize with the team regarding the restraints put on their time and budget by the top brass of Square Enix for this expansion, and I hope that they are taking this feedback to heart.

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Originally Posted by Repliku

Miqote males are an original concept from FF14, Vieras aren't, that's the biggest difference. FF14 can retcon FF14 all they want, not FFT and FF12.
Also they didn't call them Ronsos for a reason : they aren't ronsos.
And finally, needless to say, but "muh vocal minority" isn't an argument. In the sea of people who don't give a damn, you're also part of a "vocal minority".

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They can retcon Viera lore all they want. What do you think the rest of this game is? It's a theme park mmo with elements from other games, retconned to fit into ff14. They chose to keep the lore the same. Probably to minimize cost of writing new lore more than anything, though that's a guess.

Neither of your can choose who "the vocal minority" is unless you can grab me some hard stats, lol.

Woaaaa 900+!!!
No matter how you turn it, this community is great. There are always those special snowflakes that like to be d**ks but the amount we have reached, the supports that keep flooding in, is amazing.

+1 to this; I don't even have a horse in this particular race, as I was pretty interested in having two races being added at all, but if more options are available, more power to both the players and the devs.
It can only bring more meat (content and substance) to the table (the game).

FFXIV has always been a very inclusive game with varied and open options, at least since ARR, and I'd be happy if we could continue towards this trend. The fact Yoshida and the team are willing to listen in and evaluate player feedback is a chance to make the game more enjoyable for everyone, at least IMHO.

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Originally Posted by splinter1545

These things never work.

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When you waste time posting things like this instead of support, then yeah, obviously.

I would very much enjoy male Veira.

I also want to throw my support in here for the eventual release of male viera and female hrothgar, and express my disappointment in the decision to return to genderlocked races after already having addressed and corrected the issue in the past with adding male miqo'te and female roegadyn and highlanders.

Though I appreciate the effort to try to please two subsets of players at once -- those wanting viera and those wanting a bestial race -- I think this was entirely the wrong way to go about it, and in the end, alienates more people than it pleases.

I also understand that it's too late now for changes at ShB launch, but please reconsider undoing the genderlock at a later date when more development resources may be available. This is something that's extremely important to many of your players, and seemingly at one point in time, was important enough to the dev team to remove once before -- and that's the dev team whose decisions to do so I was super proud of and to which I was happy to pay my sub.

To be honest, I think fantasia sales would be greatly increased by all the people who wanted to play Male Viera, so Yoshi P and Square Enix, please get rid of genderlocking? You wallets will thank you.

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Originally Posted by redcurrant18

Give us male Viera and then I'll start paying my sub again. This hurt and it hurt bad. This is a ragequit moment for me. Goodbye until they add male Viera. This is homophobic. Still afraid of adding male bunnies huh? Stop the pathetic excuses and start listening to the people who play this game.

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Homophobic? Pffft, not even close.

A stepback from their promise not to genderlock stuff and a general, wholesome dissappointment given the work that was into it and it being what people wanted? Yes.

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Originally Posted by deadman1204

see most of the last 89 pages? But silly me, I'm just feeding a troll

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You're the main offender in the "throws random political buzzwords and doesn't provide any decent explanation" category.
Still waiting your answer regarding the fact that by your own argument you like war, injustice and human sacrifices.

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Originally Posted by oiyum

one of the main groups who were excited for male viera were the LGBT, and pretty/sexy men are generally associated with gayness (women generally enjoy a different type of male beauty than men do).

as someone who is gay, the majority of people i personally know that are mad about viera are LGBT, while the rest dont really care much about it. anecdocal evidence, but still seems to be common.

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The funny thing is that the Hrothgar actually appeal to another section of the LGBT too. They're giant bara cat men after all. I mean how many pink haired miqote would mind falling asleep on the furry chest of a Hrothgar? :v

But the thing is, the LGBT isn't just the bara types. Others are more interested in softer looking men, or at least softer in comparison to Hrothgar. They're the ones most peeved by this I imagine. Personally, I like both types.

This is what Yoshi should have done:
https://i.imgur.com/cHGgMZR.png

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Originally Posted by VillainQueen

Ever thought that something is not about you or LGBT? Ever heard about Bishounen/Ikemen, yeah... many of us girls like these type of male beauty as well and are not that into the macho ones. So not everything is a LGBT issue. And this decision is neither homophobic against anyone or sexist.

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This whole quote chain was replying to someone assuming mainly fetishizers/fujoshis wanted male viera though, lol. We're not making this about ourselves, but simply saying that there's all kinds of people who wanted them as well.

I support male viera! I was really hoping they would be included in the game, as were a lot of other players I know who have been really looking forward to it, planning to fantasia, and so on.

For those who don't understand why it would be called sexist or homophobic: there's an old q&a where Yoshida talked of how they were considering the idea of viera but a male bunny would be too "weird" (not in terms of lore, in terms of discomfort) so they wanted to make a male of another race instead. Why is making a very sexualized, skimpy dressed female character fine, but a male version was "weird" and unthinkable? Women designed to be blatantly sexually appealing to straight men are fine, yet men designed to be equally as blatantly sexually appealing to women and gay/bi men are "weird" and should be replaced with something else? Consider why anyone would find such a character "weird" and you will understand what people are getting at. There's more to say along the lines of how female characters have kept being overly sexualized in games in general but I think people are familiar enough with that argument.

I joined the forums just to say what I think about this topic.

I'd like to see male Viera and female Hrothgar added to the game. They could offer cool new ways to express male and female forms for the WoL in the way that the Miqo'te men and Roegadyn women did. The lore isn't a problem for the latter two existing as playable races, so I don't think it would be a problem for the former.

I hope the developers take the time in the coming patch cycles to rig and develop female Hrothgar and male Viera models as player characters because some interviews from Fanfest indicate they had to decide between one gender for each race. The 5.x series would be a good timing to allow them to make these, considering they had the ability to do so over the 4.x series.

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Originally Posted by VillainQueen

Ever thought that something is not about you or LGBT? Ever heard about Bishounen/Ikemen, yeah... many of us girls like these type of male beauty as well and are not that into the macho ones. So not everything is a LGBT issue. And this decision is neither homophobic against anyone or sexist.

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i said generally. also, bishounen and ikemen are barely ever sexualized, theyre idealized prettyboys. if viera males were to follow the same design archetypes as the women, they would be scantily clad and sexualized, which makes straight men much more uncomfortable than bishounen do.

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Originally Posted by oiyum

one of the main groups who were excited for male viera were the LGBT, and pretty/sexy men are generally associated with gayness (women generally enjoy a different type of male beauty than men do).

as someone who is gay, the majority of people i personally know that are mad about viera are LGBT, while the rest dont really care much about it. anecdocal evidence, but still seems to be common.

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That's a stretch and a reach if I've ever seen one. Come on now.

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Originally Posted by Repliku

You're the main offender in the "throws random political buzzwords and doesn't provide any decent explanation" category.
Still waiting your answer regarding the fact that by your own argument you like war, injustice and human sacrifices.

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All this is only happening because YoshiP said he finds bunny men "weird".
I do also think male Viera have less to do with LGBT, but I guess thanks to Yoshis statement few years ago, some feel hurt that he might not want them cause of their appearance apparently?
I mean it took like how many years to get the bunny suit for male races? And in the end the female designers just created that cause the male dev team felt uncomfortable. We can only assume, but thats why we have this unnecessary discussion here right now.

I have to thank Square-Enix for the amazing job they have done recreating Final Fantasy XIV from Scratch. Especially the inclusion of Missing Genders which we petitioned for in good faith. This was proof to us players that the Developers are truly Sympathetic to our requests and that being honest and vocal can pay off with the amazing characters we have who are Female Roegadyn, Male Miqote, and Female Highlanders. Thank You SE, Thank You Community Team, Thank You Yoshi-P.

This was posted on the official forum on the 14/04/2011 I just find it so sad and disappointing that we have now taken a step backwards

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Originally Posted by Gwenorai

I don't believe the devs were being homophobic and the likes; but I think the line of thinking was this.

Rabbits are seen as feminine - a man wearing rabbit ears or the likes is thus seen as camp or gay - which isn't true. I never viewed male Viera to be cute/camp/gay (just by appearance)- I imagined them as men who were very icy, yet beautiful and barbaric.... anyway - Thus the imagery of a feminine or 'beautiful' man is viewed as gay in some places of the world. Add this to an old interview where Yoshida said that the male Viera was 'wierd' with no explanation why other than only the males would be 'weird'. It could have been the lore he was talking about or the weirdness of adding them in as they weren't seen - or it could be that he thought that they were feminine looking and thus lies the issue.

Another reason is that the female is overly sensuous, attractive and beautiful. While the male Hrothgar is looking like 'me dumb, me brut, roar' - overly muscular and fierce looking. People are arguing that a man or a woman can be either or. A man can be beautiful and attractive, a woman can be fierce and muscular. If Male Viera [Strong, beautiful, elegant] was added and Female Hrothgar [Muscular/Fierce/Strong] was added instead of their other counterparts - I have a feeling some folks would applause it - while still asking for the counterparts but they'd still applause.

Anyway - that's what I believe. I don't know what the motives are. All I wish is for the 'tall/lean/muscular' version of male Viera and the fierce female Hrothgar.

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I think that's a good summary!

I'm in full support of male Viera for various reason. More customization, FFXIV having a take on the race instead of just copy/paste FFXII/FFA lore, and because locking out a sex option for a race is just silly (you know, like how Miqo'te and Roe).

This isn't even a lore issue. There's always the outcasts from every society that doesn't apply to the norm. Not every male Viera would hide away to defend their wood, just like not every female would stay in their wood. Look at Fran, and others, who left their home knowing they would be branded outcasts, but still left for their own reasons.

I appreciate the addition of both races, and the time the dev team took into including them. I do hope they continue to work hard for us, and give us the missing half of these races.

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Originally Posted by xbahax92

All this is only happening because YoshiP said he finds bunny men "weird".
I do also think male Viera have less to do with LGBT, but I guess thanks to Yoshis statement few years ago, some feel hurt that he might not want them cause of their appearance apparently?
I mean it took like how many years to get the bunny suit for male races? And in the end the female designers just created that cause the male dev team felt uncomfortable. We can only assume, but thats why we have this unnecessary discussion here right now.

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They made male catpeople, that shows that they aren't uncomfortable with the idea of making male versions of kemomimi characters. Ockham's razor tells me that the weirdness doesn't stem from what people force themselves to assume to try to get leverage from the oppression argument.

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Originally Posted by Lavenbun

This whole quote chain was replying to someone assuming mainly fetishizers/fujoshis wanted male viera though, lol. We're not making this about ourselves, but simply saying that there's all kinds of people who wanted them as well.

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Well he is not that wrong tho, many fetishize them. I do too to a certain extend as well. I enjoy looking at sexy anime man. I mean is it different with female Viera? Or all the guys who chose to play as girl Miqo'te in Colosseum gear? No, it's not, that's fanservice. And we don't know how they would have ended up looking like. Who said they won't be macho bunny man? And I still can't see there any of this is homophobic or a LGBT issue.

As a personal preference, I don't really like playing female characters whose design emphasis is on making them ""sexy"". I'm not interested in playing female viera, for that reason. And since, again, as a personal preference, I don't like playing ultra-bulky muscular male characters either, I'm not really interested in playing a male hrothgar instead.

So as it is, neither race announcement has anything I'm interested in. I was honestly pretty bored by the announcements; they're not my thing. I know some people were excited, but I wasn't.

However...

If the team came out with something innovative for the design of a lithe, petit, athletic male character (such as a male viera), or a bulky, muscular, strong female character (such as a female hrothgar), then I might begin to be interested... and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that way.

And the existence of such things wouldn't be taking away from the existence of female viera and male hrothgar. So, it'd simply be increasing the number of people interested in the new races. If it's something that would get more players interested, then I can't see how it's a bad thing.

Even if they were to be added in future patches (rather than on Shadowbringers launch with the viera F/hrothgar M), I'd still be interested to see the development of the designs, and I'd still be very excited for the implementation.

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Originally Posted by Atreyu

That's a stretch and a reach if I've ever seen one. Come on now.

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people were looking for an explanation, and i gave you one. its your judgement on whether youre going to believe it or not.

i personally doubt that not adding male viera was purposefully because yoshida hates the gays, but you also have to understand that this is one of very, very few mmos that was accepting of lgbt people. having male viera (the archetype twink, and one that doesnt look weirdly proportioned like the male miqote) be dangled before us and then taken away made a lot of gay people feel like FFXIV isnt as accepting of us as it seemed to be.

again, i dont want to force you to believe that the backlash is justified, or that male viera is such a huge deal, only to understand how the LGBT community (at least the part i am in) percieves these news.

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Originally Posted by xbahax92

All this is only happening because YoshiP said he finds bunny men "weird".

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Yoshi's statement a few years ago, so far as I can tell, was related to lore. Assuming otherwise, especially when he is not a native English speaker, is jumping the gun and trying to pursue a narrative that isn't there. Men can marry men in this game, for god's sake.

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Originally Posted by xbahax92

I mean it took like how many years to get the bunny suit for male races? And in the end the female designers just created that cause the male dev team felt uncomfortable.

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Citation needed.

I'm in support of Male Viera being playable!
Them having stature similar to Alphinaud's would be a very refreshing change of pace.

Please consider doing away with the genderlock on both of the new races! i appreciate your hard work and i'm looking forward to Shadowbringers! ^^

Sorry forgot to cardit Cairdeas for the original 2011 post

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Originally Posted by oiyum

i said generally. also, bishounen and ikemen are barely ever sexualized, theyre idealized prettyboys. if viera males were to follow the same design archetypes as the women, they would be scantily clad and sexualized, which makes straight men much more uncomfortable than bishounen do.

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No, no they are. You really should take a look to the adult oriented side of the otome community. Oh boy they are. But anyway your argument is based on how they might look like, even though no one really knows how they would look like. And that is no conversation that has to occur till we actually see them.

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Originally Posted by oiyum

Snip.

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You know nothing of how I feel about the male Viera not being included. Trust me, I know all too well that this game is very LGBT friendly. It's one of the many reasons that I love it.
This argument about who likes who, who is attracted to whom, and all these other wild generalizations are doing nobody any good. In fact, it hurts our argument.

Sincerely, a gay ftm who was looking forward to male Viera, too.

I have been hoping for male viera for years now. I won't stop fighting for it. Please listen to the player base SE.

I think regardless of all this, Yoshi respects the LGBT. That's why he personally okayed that float for the LGBT parade. He knows we have fantasia money too since we're don't spend it all on our screaming kids. :v He probably thought he was giving the gays what they wanted with the Hrothgar, and he was right about that to an extent, but he didn't account for all the gays who wanted male Viera too.


Give him time, I think he'll fix this eventually. Let's not come for his wig...

… yet.

100% would love to see the addition of Male Viera, big fan of extra customisation options at all times. No reason to have male Mi'qote if we can't have male Viera also!

Here to show support.
I'm not really even considering playing either new race myself, but I'm still rather disappointed with the genderlock. The genderlocking feels artificially and unnecessarily restrictive. The two missing race/gender combinations could be used to fill missing character creation niches, and I can't recall "more customization" ever being considered a bad thing on any reasonable basis. On that note, I still haven't heard any actually convincing arguments as to why they shouldn't be included.

Now, I do understand that at this point in development, asking for them to be added for 5.0 is unreasonable. However, it should not be unreasonable to ask for the other genders to be added sometime in the future. In 5.3, 5.4,... heck, 6.0. Even if the addition is delayed by a year or two, just knowing that it would be coming eventually is better than "no not happening."

Also, I would like to add, that this looks like it would be a good business move. While yes, it will take some development time, I know some people are actively unsubbing from the game because of this. Whereas the addition should definitely earn a decent amount from fantasia sales, and earn back most if not all of those subscriptions, and probably new ones as well. And I seriously doubt that their addition would generate any notable backlash. If any were to happen, it would definitely be much more minor than this.