Gender locked race?

[cicatriz313]

I always thought of Fran (the main example of Viera to me as a child) as the strongest character in the story, mostly because of the Viera being women only (visibly) plus the scene where she goes berserk due to the mist. Also she always seemed to be the knowledgeable character in the story, giving the background of different locations as you traveled. The Eruyt Village part of the story was interesting to me because of the isolationism as well as being able to communicate with the wood and how leaving it left Fran kind of disconnected from the rest of the Viera.

That's why the Viera (Fran) was always so popular in my view, anyway.

[MrKimper]

Looking like genderlocked is pretty much confirmed.

[BillyKaplan]

I hope they're ready for a lot of booing in the next FanFest

[Crushnight]

I hope they're ready for a lot of booing in the next FanFest

It's JP community they most likely won't boo they'd just be silent us on the otherhand will have both boos and cheers we'll see which is louder :P

[Lacan]

It's JP community they most likely won't boo they'd just be silent us on the otherhand will have both boos and cheers we'll see which is louder :P

I'm expecting a repeat of the limited job reveal. Confusion and the silent sound of hearts breaking. :v Yoshi why

[Anzaman]

I hope they're ready for a lot of booing in the next FanFest

With people wanting so many different variants of "male Viera", that'd be almost guaranteed even if they'd reveal one.

As long as female Viera looks and feels good, AND has possibility of lowering length noticeable from Fran, I'm OK.

[WhiteArchmage]

True, I never did get into the plot of 12, but I don't recall the Viera being anything other than window dressing and to give the game some fetish fodder with the whole thing with the no men and them falling devotedly in love with men (Fran and Mydia), we don't see to see much else from them they barly interact with the story and the village felt completely tacked in.

I always assumed they were popular for that reason, I never saw any other but maybe that's why I despise them so much.

Fran's relationship with Balthier is really subdued and for most of the game it seems like nothing but a friendly professional one (with special fist bump, even), and she's a much stronger character than that. Often times acting as an exposition character by telling the (suppossed) nature of Espers, the effects of the Mist and, of course, Golmore. Viera are stoic and have their own little side-stories about not understanding the larger world of Ivalice because of their isolationism, and the problems that come with their rigid society ("Viera who have forsaken the Wood are Viera no longer" and the Vorpal Bunny hunt mark, for example, and before someone gets here, I know the story outright says they're content with it, nor do the player characters feel like they have to change it ;p). Saying "falling in love devotedly with men" is ignoring most of their characterization.

[Tsumdere]

I always thought of Fran (the main example of Viera to me as a child) as the strongest character in the story, mostly because of the Viera being women only (visibly) plus the scene where she goes berserk due to the mist. Also she always seemed to be the knowledgeable character in the story, giving the background of different locations as you traveled. The Eruyt Village part of the story was interesting to me because of the isolationism as well as being able to communicate with the wood and how leaving it left Fran kind of disconnected from the rest of the Viera.

That's why the Viera (Fran) was always so popular in my view, anyway.

As a little girl, Fran was always my favorite character because of these exact reasons. She was smart, strong, calm, and beautiful. Fran was there to give the rest of the younger characters some knowledge when needed or to guide them to where they needed to go since she was more perceptive than the rest of the team. She had a subtle and tragic backstory where she longed not only for the Wood and her sisters, but also to explore the world with Balthier.
I exclusively only controlled her and Ashe, with many 'rees' when had to play someone else.
To reduce Viera to nothing more than fetish fodder because they are a society of women who wear more revealing clothes is disingenuous imo.

As for the male Viera in XII, they were never needed so it never came off as strange. In an MMO setting, where any race can be called by Hydaelyn to be her champion, it would be incredibly odd for the male half of a race to be excluded from this. Does Hydaelyn think bunny men are weird too? There would flat out be no good reason SE could come up with in lore besides absolute genocide PRIOR to the beginning of the game (which we know it's not true or else the Wandering Dramaturge would have said something) to exclude the player character from being a male Viera considering in canon it could be the only male Viera that would leave.

[Lacan]

With people wanting so many different variants of "male Viera", that'd be almost guaranteed even if they'd reveal one.

As long as female Viera looks and feels good, AND has possibility of lowering length noticeable from Fran, I'm OK.

I'm sure the reception of any sort of male Viera would be taken better than announcing "Hey, we're giving you guys a genderlocked race again." That's not going to fly very well no matter how they spin it. They can offer people something else, but it isn't going to distract people from their crushed expectations.

[cicatriz313]

I'm sure the reception of any sort of male Viera would be taken better than announcing "Hey, we're giving you guys a genderlocked race again." That's not going to fly very well no matter how they spin it. They can offer people something else, but it isn't going to distract people from their crushed expectations.

I mean yeah, but at the same time I think overall the reaction will be positive as long as what they do offer looks good. There will be those crushed because they've been wanting to be male Viera since they came into this world, but I expect the majority of players don't have such strong ties to the idea.