As a male gamer, thank you for not oversexualizing every female NPC

[WinterLuna]

Some people really take things out of context and too far.. The OP was just expressing his appreciation for something and he has every right to. Kinda sick of seeing arguments on every thread like this when that clearly wasn't the OP's intention.

[goob]

I love boobs as much as the next guy, but it gets to the point of insulting when game companies assume that's all we care about. Sure T&A isn't completely absent, but neither is it at annoying levels.

Well, I've seen some very scantily clad female NPCs in the game. I expect to see the same in player characters that are females (most of which are played by males... lol) but I have seen a lot of NPCs that could use some more clothing. I probably mostly notice it in cut scenes where the chat bubble is located right under the female's chest. But yes it could be a lot worse.

Why is it the male NPCs in most MMOs are dressed in full armour, often with spikes sticking out of their bulky gear, yet the female NPCs are often covered with the equivalent of a fig leaf or a loin cloth? Yeah I know it's likely a male developer thing, but females DO play MMOs.

Give me the equivalent of a scantily clad Brad Pitt companion and I'll be happy.

I'm curious as to why some people think that if a female character is dressed in a bikini they're a G.I.R.L.? I'm a woman and I enjoy dressing my character in a bikini or in revealing outfits sometimes. Are we not supposed to be silly or sexy? Are we supposed to be nuns or something?

Most of the time when I've seen a female character running around wearing very little AND I later talked to the person who was playing that character, it was normally a male. They would say, "Yes I'm playing a female character because I don't want to look at a guy all the time." I don't really care who plays what... they're just pixels and people should play whatever character they want to play as long as they're having fun. But from *my* experience, a male is more likely to be playing a female character if the female isn't wearing much clothing. Of course this really isn't saying much since there are probably still more males playing MMOs than females, but from what I read not too long ago that gap is narrowing.

[Burnphase]

I'm curious as to why some people think that if a female character is dressed in a bikini they're a G.I.R.L.? I'm a woman and I enjoy dressing my character in a bikini or in revealing outfits sometimes. Are we not supposed to be silly or sexy? Are we supposed to be nuns or something?

they're projecting their sexism onto you

[Kosmos992k]

Yes, you can throw a handful of really old examples of what would serve as precursors to modern 'moe', but 'moe' as we know it today didn't become as crazy-ubiquitous in Japan until the mid-90s/early 00's. I'm talking hundreds and hundreds of series designed specifically to pander towards the otaku demographic with girls styled in that ever-so-recognizable moe fashion. The anime industry in particular exploded with this stuff, and to this day you see it EVERYWHERE. There was a definite and recognizable shift towards this style of design. That's what I mean when I say 'the moe craze'.

The mid 90's were literally two decades ago, that is not recent. The anime industry has paralleled the game industry, I'm not sure that moe is the driver here. You're also deliberately ignoring the cultural phenomenon of 'cute' that pervades a lot of pop culture in Japan. You talk of moe being something that is designed to pander to Otaku, clearly labelling it as something you see as negative. I disagree with you. First of all, Otaku is not a term limited to anime fanatics who like cute characters that they want to protect. I do think that you are taking a purely negative view of something that is neither negative, nor exclusive to a specific group of Otaku. The very same cute and vulnerable characters can be appealing to both genders. The fact that a vocal minority find some form of unwholesom pleasure with moe characters in ther H-games, should and does not condemn moe or cuteness to be nothing but fantasy fodder to a small number of fans with a hole in their life that these things fill. I am certain that we will need to agree to disagree though.

they're projecting their sexism onto you

Indeed, and yet at the same time, they believe that they are absolutely not being sexist.

With that, I will apologize for the off topic posts, agree that SE do a good job keeping their NPCs appropriately dressed, and diagree with any who have a problem with the tiny number of somewhat sexy clothing options. And so I will exit the topic rather than drag it further off topic.

[RyuuSkyez]

..................

[Samcaesar]

Snip

It sorta does? I mean, it's kind I suppose people could boycott the game.. But that's not always needed, heck it shouldn't be needed. Money isn't always the determining factor in things, like, SE can just write a good, believable fantasy world for the sake of writing a good, believable fantasy world.

Snip

It's not a taboo, heck I'm quite fine with sexuality in games, I just don't want none of it if it means nearly (Gotta have your one token tough girl in armor!) every woman is wearing. You can express sexuality while not making the women of a story nearly entirely. Plus there's reasonable immersion breaking, IE "magic", and there's "Girls wear bikinis, guys wear armor" which is tacky and

Pornography is meant to be sexual, video games should not unless if it's done in an appropriate and tasteful manor. ( Or unless if they're that sort of game seriously.)

Snip

Not all primals are monsters, but the two (Out of the 12 I think we currently have if you count 12 twelve as one primal, and also add Odin and Bahamut Prime) girl primals have very "Sexy" human like qualities. I could let Shiva slide, she's based off the image of an Elezen, Garuda however, which is goddess of the Ixal (A species that has very little sexual dimorphism), why on earth does most of her body look so human when she's summoned by beastmen, there's been instances of Garuda not looking like a human/harpy before.

"If you want x in the setting of y, go do z instead" is always a horrible response, either explain your reasoning on why FFXIV can't have girl monsters that look monstrous or don't say something. I don't want to play bloodborne, I want to play FFXIV. Heck, Bloodborne is more of a case in point that Japanese people can easily make monster women look monstrous, so why the heck can't SE do the same?

Forgive me, I wasn't referring to what she was talking about being creepy. I meant she creeped me the **** out.

It's fine, sorry if I offended you, she kinda creeps me out a little too! Apparently it's not Boxxy, but the girl it actually is isn't much different so.. Shrugs.

Snip

No one is mad about you in a sexy get up, it's more of a "Jeez, kinda weird how you decide to fight in a cold climate in that of all gear." I agree that it's not your job to keep "immersion" nor should people outwardly care what you wear, but it's not someone's fault for at least raising a brow whenever they see you fighting monsters in the snow in a set that shows off a ton of skin. Like.. They likely don't freak out about people wearing bikinis and swimwear because it's appropriate summer time wear. Like, in the same vein of that, are you just gonna shrug off some guy coming to a very serious corporate meeting in a gimp suit? He could be a fantastic business man, but let's not lie here, you're going to be weirded out when he's the only one wearing a gimp suit in a room full of suits.

I'm not going to address your second paragraph because, hey wear what you want, but just don't get so frustrated whenever people get a little weirded out by what you wear while you're going around playing the game. I mean, don't you feel a little odd in some cutscenes or do you just skip them?

The light steel galerus set as the vanity one, coliseum galerus is the actual set, are the ones you're looking for I think.

Snip

This is a T rated game, not necessarily for children, plus it's got better writing in it than a lot of games with a lot of titillation

The clothing of the characters is hardly "prude" in this game. Plus, game for adults can have women characters dressed in "prude" clothes too, look at the HALO series (Both video games and extended universe material), with the exception of Cortana, lots of the characters are dressed pretty "prude".

Snip .

Apparently a fan of Boxxy, plus her politics seem pretty bunk after watching about.. 1/3 of one of her videos and looking at the topics of other related videos.

Soo... Same difference?

Snip

I dunno, you might be able to explain the Forgotten Springs as less of a "Sandy places wear light cloths" and more of a whole Sun Seeker culture thing. I'd argue equipment in sunny and sand would be incredibly covering, just thinner, breathable fabrics, you'd risk getting a little warm if it meant preventing some horrid sunburns.

Snip

I mean, the giant hole in the middle of the signature armor for DRGs is hardly subtle. Besides, they're plenty noticeable if you just look at the armor you're wearing, especially the job themed armor that's suppose to be indicative of the class. The boob/skin windows are still tacky and unneeded when the male version of the armor lacks it.

Snip

As a side note, Zyrusticae covered what I talked about fairly well earlier, my reply was just a tad late, so I'll put it in a box as you've also seemed to bow out of the conversation.

Did you miss the "fantasy settings" part of my post, ie me saying "In general fantasy games do this crap"? If I ever direct a complaint about "bikini armor" in the context of FFXIV it's at people who keep talking about "I want revealing sexy clothes (For women)!" and don't even bother to talk about adding some revealing sexy clothes for men. I've said it before I think this game generally does a relatively good job with its armor. A lot of my complaints are directed towards other fantasy games in which do have plenty of "boob armor" with women and actual armor for men, and that general idea has plenty of problematic elements to it that I'd wish to stay away from a game like FFXIV considering its somewhat alright track record.

Sure, I suppose one a DoM could withstand an attack wearing cloth armor assuming the cloth has some extremely powerful defensive magic (Note, DoM tend to be incredibly squishy and not really able to take "primal attacks wearing cloth" sans being massively over leveled). Who knows the exact lore reasons behind the protective ability of some sets over others (Though I have no idea what "Rainbow gear set" you're talking about), it can't be strictly just "Magic" or else why bother making protective armor at all? It's not exactly 1:1 "More bulk = More protection", but you can't deny the fact that there has to be some reason for the armor to be more than just strips of "super magic cloth".

That statement was a broad one about "bikini armor on PCs/NPCs" on games outside of this one, which relatively handles armor generally far better (I mean god forbid men get feminine vanity clothes and girl DRG have more sensible armor but only one of those really has to do with the topic on hand). Plus.. Pretty sure I've seen plenty of people complaining both about people taking "Moral high grounds" and those people complaining about oversexualization, while no one's directly said it, plenty of people definitely have a "If SE made the game like this I'd be very pleased, people need to get over it if it does happen." I'm not arguing against "Battle bikinis" being a thing entirely, I'm arguing against constructing a setting where most of the women are wearing battle bikinis and the like while men get legitimate armor, which some people seem to be quite fine with considering complacency with regards to making more sets that are "sexy" for women (Interestingly enough I've yet to see anything towards making "sexy/revealing sets for men with the exception of already in game sets). So, either start talking about some elegant, revealing dresses for men as well or accept the fact that you folks really only want them for girls and don't care for it on the men.

Sorry, the "I suppose" meant a "I don't really think so but I guess if you stretched the definition", I write/type it frequently in casual dialogue along with "I mean" due to developed speech quirks. There still is an issue with girl monsters kinda frequently being made "sexy" and more human, while boy monsters don't really look too "sexy" and if they're humanoid they're a good bit more monstrous looking than their girl counterparts.

Snip

"Moe blob" anime is still plenty popular (Shoot, look at Hayao Miyazaki's comments towards the current state of the industry, the man knows the industry far better than a lot of people), and yes, "moe blob" anime is meant to pander to anime Otaku for.. A few reasons. Otaku has a lot of correlative meanings with "Big massive anime geek" in the west, and plenty of people in Japan use it to mean "Anime geek". They can be cute to anyone, but you've got to examine "Why?" if the answer is "Well, it panders to specific niches of Otaku who are (Gonna leave out this term)" then yes, it's negative, a hundred million people can like it because it's cute and that's fine, but that doesn't separate it from its intent. Motive for creation in a fictional setting is very important, sometimes more important than the consequences, as the designer made this character/set of character/plot/et cetera with a certain idea which shapes the fictional world. Therefore if the designer makes something with an objectively negative intent (Which plenty of them do), then the intent follows through and becomes inseparable to a degree even if plenty of people enjoy it with good intentions.


And as a more "What the OP wanted" point. I still can't think of any girls in heavy armor that are main characters sans Livia or Lucia, anyone know any character I'm missing

[Delorean]

idc

but hey square thanks for making an awesome game =D

[Pinkie_Pie]

Oh HEY, here's a quote from the devs

Q85. What is with the small Miqo’te that can be seen in that one area? Is this something we will be able to choose as a new race in the future?

A85. Please look forward to future development. It’s difficult to implement races that have expression limitations and other issues. By the way, Lalafell heads are too big to treat them as children!

- Bayohne

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...49#post3129149

See, yay I'm a fully grown 34 years old woman that loves to dress very sexy mexy (͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Furiea]

I kinda wish they allowed bigger boob size tho...

[SuzakuCMX]

I kinda wish they allowed bigger boob size tho...

They increased it in 3.0.

Anything bigger and you will have to order your character's armor through a specialty online retailer...