The Last Races

[Fland]

With the amount that our characters' bodies can already clip through themselves during certain poses... it possibly could be.

This is more of a technical issue. And like you said, it's already present in current body shape.

Tone is generated by understanding the interaction of human instinct and culture. Taking fashion as an art, there might be different traditions and preferences but you can absolutely still gauge whether the overall craftsmanship works or doesn't. You can prefer something that is poor craftsmanship or dislike something that is high craftsmanship, but the technical side of evaluation is still there and can be judged in a largely consistent way.

Finishing up, for what it's worth people are still totally free to disagree with me and I won't take it to heart! I don't know everything, just tend to speak in firmer language when analyzing. Fully aware this is opinion stuff, and while I might believe it strongly I've changed my mind before haha.

Also there are definitely some great looking Roe casters/awkward looking lalas in the world too.

Hmm.. even if they manage to make a proportionate bigger body shape and gears whose craftsmanship objectively suitable to them, some people would still not find them aesthetically pleasing. So I guess subjectivity is still in play here.

But hopefully, SE will consider this overall craftsmanship objectivity like you said, and not discouraged by the possible subjectivity that comes with it, when they decide to try experimenting with bigger body shape.

[Jaywalker]

Hmm.. even if they manage to make a proportionate bigger body shape and gears whose craftsmanship objectively suitable to them, some people would still not find them aesthetically pleasing. So I guess subjectivity is still in play here.

But hopefully, SE will consider this overall craftsmanship objectivity like you said, and not discouraged by the possible subjectivity that comes with it, when they decide to try experimenting with bigger body shape.

Yup! Like I mentioned, some of the most beautiful and interesting visuals can come from not 100% embodying a beauty ideal but still engaging in creative dialogue with it. That's why I mentioned how I still figure Elezen can be beautiful for example, they might be more challenging to navigate in some ways relative to the stuff I mentioned but that doesn't mean the results are less impressive or fun. It's just more "hard mode" in some ways. Hyur midlanders, miqo'te in-general, and au ra play more into conventional proportions so makes sense to me that their overall popularity is higher. Most things will fit and look good for them. There are still hugely popular elezen characters though for example, even if the race gets played less often. And the variation is still valuable imo, you can create some really powerful tonal impacts with body type variation. Male Roegadyn and Highlanders have some of the most imposing visual potential in the game, and imo there's value to that. It's also possible to play with and subvert those body type expectations in fun, memorable ways. 100% possible to pull off a gentle giant visual.

I think Hrothgar were a little bit of a gamble for SE because they are farther from the human side of things, but they're also kind of like lalafells where they're inhuman enough that I doubt they'll suffer for it. They're not being judged on human terms so much. The serious question on how much they're willing to break with expectations/conventions will come from if they're willing to do slim-and-pretty bunny boys and equally animalistic female hrothgar, since those types aren't seen as often. If they do those and find success (which I suspect they will), then down the line they might be open to continued experimentation.

Here's hoping!