Female Hrothgar as a playable race. Show your support!

[Lauront]

I really like the tabaxi approach to female hroths. It’d be neat if they finally did another race like hyur and had one clan be big lion/panther women and the other clan be more like big cats, like cheetah or lynx.

I don’t think it will happen since the make hroths got “do you want a hot lion or a cold lion? Now pick from 4 faces and 2 hairs.” But you know, a girl can dream.

Anyway, given that Yoship made a big show about the wanting this game to last for at least another decade, I do think we will get both female hrothgar and male viera at some point. Possibly after a massive upgrade, as that is something they will absolutely 100% need to do if this game is going to last. He has gone on record several times (as recently as the last month) saying that they are reaching their limits on what they can do and that it impacts their workflow significantly. With the conclusion of 6.0 seeing us moving into a “new adventure”, my money is on the overhaul being then, and with it, the absent genders.

I'm a bit late to the party but as I posted in the male Viera thread, we got this, which is good news longer term:

Famitsu: Will there be any graphic improvements for the expansion this time? If so, will there be any demand on higher PC spec requirements?

Yoshi: No, not at all.

We’re improving the rendering on the Playstation 5 and allow players to play with slightly better graphics. The rest will remain basically the same. However, we do think of reworking the graphics engine in the future.

All the assets we’ve created for the past 10 years ended up in enormous amounts here and on top of that, the data folder structure will have to be restructured in order to make this work. In addition to that, there’s also a demand for 4K texture support.

To begin with, I think we will have to change the way we work on creating the graphics in order to do this.

For example, to make the mantle flutter even more, we will have to change the concept called “bones” that are located on the rig, install a physics engine on it, and it is necessary to perform physical adjustments on each character in order to make this work. Doing so will end up overperforming here, so in order to deal with this, we will have to ensure that it will be possible to turn off the character physics calculations of other players. But if we do so, the mantle visual seen on other players will end up cracking because of this.

All of these elements will have to be included and fixed from the ground up, and considering we want to deliver the best game experience due to the importance of the end of Hydaelyn-Zodiark arc as well, the progress is currently put on hold for now.

However, we are indeed laying preliminary arrangements, and we are conducting research here. This applies to the Data Center Travel that was announced earlier but we are moving our projects forward on a multiyear basis here. so in a way, players are able to go on exciting adventures with the current spec required and this will be unchanged for now, and I want players to be able to do so without worrying too much.

However, you can interpret this whole answer as “Yoshida did mention that he wants to do this”, and I don’t mind if you tell readers that.

Adding to that, it would be great if you could also let them know that it will be a tremendous amount of work involved here. (laughs)

Given the timeframe they've mentioned for the game lasting, and their investment in it, I'm more optimistic now that we'll see the missing sexes and also upgrades to it, as you mention, as such upgrades will be essential later down the line, to keep the game looking fresh. The question is the order in which they will do it but it would be logical to do the engine first, to make such additions easier, and then tackle the missing sexes, because the issues tie together. With that said, I'm thinking it'll be 7.0 or later realistically, although sooner would be nice.

[Tsumdere]

Are these more references to au ra? Which I have never personally brought up first in here? It's getting old, can we talk about female hrothgar?

I know for sure femininity isn't defined as being a 7 foot tall muscled she-hulk. That's for sure.

No, I was not talking about Au Ra at all, but apparently you are. It was just annoying seeing you constantly squawking about Fem Roe looking like men when they look like normal, well-built women. You sound just like the girls who used to bully my sister for being tall and having broad shoulders, because their idea of what women should look like is so highly distorted.

----

The latest interview is really a breath of fresh air. It's good to know they are looking into updating the graphics and improving the framework on which it is built on. I've always been in the camp that they would not turn a deaf ear to players very vehemently asking for the missing genders and would acknowledge it with a definite answer at some point.

Whether it be "no, we'll never do it" or "yes, we're working on it" - either would be better than silence.

[Awha]

No, I was not talking about Au Ra at all, but apparently you are. It was just annoying seeing you constantly squawking about Fem Roe looking like men when they look like normal, well-built women. You sound just like the girls who used to bully my sister for being tall and having broad shoulders, because their idea of what women should look like is so highly distorted.

----

The latest interview is really a breath of fresh air. It's good to know they are looking into updating the graphics and improving the framework on which it is built on. I've always been in the camp that they would not turn a deaf ear to players very vehemently asking for the missing genders and would acknowledge it with a definite answer at some point.

Whether it be "no, we'll never do it" or "yes, we're working on it" - either would be better than silence.

It does suck, but being tall and having broad shoulders sadly are not traits many would use to define a women. We have to take the social normative perspective into account even if we are in disagreement with it. It sucks but I do not think it is fair to say their view is distorted because they do not align up with what we think. My mom is 6'7 she is taller then me and am not short. Sad truth is when people do not fit within the standard bubble they are mocked for it do to how uncommon it is that is life as my mom would put it.

Though even my mom admits that if she was being honest her overall profile seems to fit more of a male then female and that is life.

[Lihtleita]

ANYWAY
(women might look like men sometimes because surprise we are the same species and dont have drastic sexual dimorphism)
i wonder if they will have the same hair restrictions as their male counterparts or would they keep the fur pattern system

[reivaxe]

I'm a bit late to the party but as I posted in the male Viera thread, we got this, which is good news longer term:



Given the timeframe they've mentioned for the game lasting, and their investment in it, I'm more optimistic now that we'll see the missing sexes and also upgrades to it, as you mention, as such upgrades will be essential later down the line, to keep the game looking fresh. The question is the order in which they will do it but it would be logical to do the engine first, to make such additions easier, and then tackle the missing sexes, because the issues tie together. With that said, I'm thinking it'll be 7.0 or later realistically, although sooner would be nice.

Thanks for sharing the info.
Depends on how they wanna do it, they could add in the genders in 6.0 and just address everything at once for the update later or they could wait. Regardless I feel confidant that they will address the genders at some point.

ANYWAY
(women might look like men sometimes because surprise we are the same species and dont have drastic sexual dimorphism)
i wonder if they will have the same hair restrictions as their male counterparts or would they keep the fur pattern system

Ehh, it's a bit more complicated than that. Human's have pretty decent sexual dimorphism in that you can typically tell people gender with ease which is why we all know what feminine and masculine body shapes are. But humans are also very physically diverse so not everyone fits 1 group or another clearly.

As for Hrothgar, they're based on lions which are the only cat group that has clear and obvious sexual dimorphism. My vote has legit been that the females are just bald because of how stupidly forced YP has made this mane concept. Until they give me a non-bald depiction that's my vote.

[-JayJay-]

All this talk of cat women and it seems like nobody has even mentioned the cat woman Square Enix reintroduced people to last year:

Belladonna (Trials of Mana)

I personally feel like she captures the "fierce", "beastly", "regal" and "feminine" traits quite well while also maintaining a form that isn't "small" and/or "dainty". She even has some noticeable (but not too prominent) muscle tone on her arms and legs. I think if female Hrothgars ended up looking similar to this it'd be serviceable, all I'd hope for is that they'd have some noticeable abs and the muscle tone on the arms and legs are just little bit more prominent on them considering that the males have noticeable muscle definition.

[BunniEclair]

I'm a bit late to the party but as I posted in the male Viera thread, we got this, which is good news longer term:



Given the timeframe they've mentioned for the game lasting, and their investment in it, I'm more optimistic now that we'll see the missing sexes and also upgrades to it, as you mention, as such upgrades will be essential later down the line, to keep the game looking fresh. The question is the order in which they will do it but it would be logical to do the engine first, to make such additions easier, and then tackle the missing sexes, because the issues tie together. With that said, I'm thinking it'll be 7.0 or later realistically, although sooner would be nice.

This is so exciting! Thank you for sharing it! While it’s disappointing we have a while to wait, I do think you’re right about the engine update coming first before female hroth/ male viera. It just doesn’t make sense to do it now if they have such big changes on the horizon. They can barely do anything with their models without struggling as it is, and the current state of viera and hroth really put a spotlight on them reaching critical mass.

[WhiteArchmage]

All this talk of cat women and it seems like nobody has even mentioned the cat woman Square Enix reintroduced people to last year:

Belladonna (Trials of Mana)

I personally feel like she captures the "fierce", "beastly", "regal" and "feminine" traits quite well while also maintaining a form that isn't "small" and/or "dainty". She even has some noticeable (but not too prominent) muscle tone on her arms and legs. I think if female Hrothgars ended up looking similar to this it'd be serviceable, all I'd hope for is that they'd have some noticeable abs and the muscle tone on the arms and legs are just little bit more prominent on them considering that the males have noticeable muscle definition.

Trials of Mana is a gem and everybody should play it; hell, all the Mana series. Remake Legend of Mana, but make the blacksmithing thing be less obtuse. Also, I think they hired a furry artist for the ToM remake and that's why the Beast people look so good.

[-JayJay-]

Also, I think they hired a furry artist for the ToM remake and that's why the Beast people look so good.

Yup. Furries apparently joked about it, but it turned out to be the truth.

[reivaxe]

Belladonna art is a good find.

Outside of changing the feet and hair not much scaling changes would have to be done to match the in game Female Hrothgar Art and I had thought of "tiny nose & mouth with big eyes" as 1 possible route they could take the cat head design.