Where is FFXIV headed in terms of sexism?

[Charismatic]

As a female, playing a female character, I have to say that I personally have never had a problem with the outfits. I like clothes. I like gear. I like the artistic design of it, I like the way it looks on my character, I like that it occasionally blatently defies the laws of physics. (Like the female hyur undershirt. They would NOT be that stable without some form of support that that flimsy piece of cloth is NOT providing. Underwire, anyone?) I enjoy it, in a 'this looks awesome, but why would I wear armor with a gaping whole in the middle into battle?' sorta way. I occasionally spend excessive amounts of time hunting for gear that's hopelessly out of date stat wise cuz I like the way it looks. Such is my prerogative, because that's part of what I, as a player, enjoy doing in the game, and brings me happiness.

What I do object to is when other players make me feel as though I should be embarrassed to wear gear, or make a big deal of its 'sexiness'. Maybe it's an issue of how deeply people identify with their characters, but when I log in, I think 'that's my character,' not 'that's me'. So when people make flirting comments I'm always vaugely confused, because I'm not wearing that gear. I'm in jeans and a tee-shirt, with a can of mountain dew. It's a fantasy world, where we don't have to worry about practical concerns like cold, or heat, or battle wounds, or real physics, so why shouldn't my character wear whatever looks cute? But my character isn't a person, she's just a collection of 1s and 0s. So I guess it's when people transfer her visual appearance onto me that it gets wierd for me.

TLDR: The gear itself doesn't cause problems. It falls to the playerbase to treat each other like human beings, regardless of what their digital avatar looks like. So...don't be creepers. If you're gonna fantasize about someone's char, kindly keep it to yourself.

End the thread right here, best post.

[AlaulaTheGreat]

But you see those abs? Those abs!
If we are gonna call sexism, we must say that no man/woman is attracted to small boobs. In fact, we must say that small boobs in general are soo disgusting, that by comparison to larger ones the amount of turned-on-ness is largely disproportionate.

But yeah guys, stop being silly, its a game.

[Elexia]

Side note:

giggly gahosafats

I've never heard breasts be called this.

[Imoen]

Besides Fran, maybe lulu the others are more modest then what we have in FFXIV. (Dont count FFX-2 because its not even the same world anymore :/ , obvious their target audience changed for that game).

I dunno Ashe and yuffie might as well not be wearing pants, selphie that short yellow skirt. I didn't realize were just talking about tops here. Anyway I was just naming more Final Fantasy characters that have outfits that could be considered to have sex apeal or w/e you want to call it. Yes I was refering to x-2 yuna not x yuna,

[Elexia]

Well usually this subject matter is referring to particular parts as objectifying and the only way it can heads toward "being worse in this regard" is the fact SE is adding breast physics.

Outfits are all in personal taste as to what you find it as sexy/slutty whatever. Someone went onto every topic calling every woman who wore the bikini a slut because bikinis = slutty to him and he was dead serious about it.

[Colvin]

I dunno Ashe and yuffie might as well not be wearing pants, selphie that short yellow skirt. I didn't realize were just talking about tops here. Anyway I was just naming more Final Fantasy characters that have outfits that could be considered to have sex apeal or w/e you want to call it. Yes I was refering to x-2 yuna not x yuna,

yeah rikku and Lulu's boobs were more than enough for x-1

[Maxwell]

- Are you concerned about female objectification?
- Are you concerned with how far the FFXIV team will go with sexism?
- Does it in any way effect your enjoyment of the game?
- Has it ever effected how you have been treated as a female avatar?

• No. I have not seen any evidence of womens treated as objects by the game itself or by people around me. Please provide clear* examples or state precisely what is your definition of objectification because i think its critically flawed.
• No. I have not seen any evidence of sexism by the game or dev team. Please provide clear* examples or look up sexism in a dictionnary.
• No. See the previous statements.
• No. See the previous statements.

Revealing outfits or other objects cannot be equated to sexism or objectification. These are concepts tied only to people's behavior. Do not blame the game for how people consider you. Blame them.

*To me, your original examples are just declarative statements of sexism and objectification tied only to loose assumptions and stretched personal interpretations rather than facts.

[Valmonte]

if its Female anything im eyeballing it, i dont really care whats on the other end of it.

although i must admit if that last live letter was anything to go by....i'm going to have eyeball fatigue by the time i'm done with the game........not that i find that bad in anyway

Edit: and as long as the Neko Fantasy players are restricted to the lvl 1 miniskirt and coliseum gear, i'm not panicking.. yet.

[Hyrist]

This is a hornet's nest of made up issues, but I'll bite.

- Are you concerned about female objectification?
No. And neither should you, really. This is a game of fantasy and as such people of both genders will be objectivfied. If you've played FFXI or even parts of FFXIV, you'll realize that there are skimpy outfits for both genders. Subligaria isn't a popular 'thing' because it dosen't objectify men. It's popular because it gloriously objectifies men.


- Are you concerned with how far the FFXIV team will go with sexism?
Absolutely not. Concerns over sexual matters in this game thus far have only been raised by oversensitive alarmists and their complaints were quickily calmed down by moderate opinions. Not just a game, but in every Square Enix game, the subject of sex has been handeled fairly well. This is a company that handels sexuality very well. Just because a couple choice pieces of armor happen to be exposing dosen't suddenly mean they disrespect you as a wo/man.


- Does it in any way effect your enjoyment of the game?
I'd question to what you're referring to in this matter. However, I would say that SE's approach to sexuality and the realities of them has improved my enjoyment of the game.

There are going to be people, both players and NPCs, that are not afraid of exposing their body and being objectified. This happens in real life and taking a personal preference against it does not make the more conservative opinion right in any way shape or form.

- Has it ever effected how you have been treated as a female avatar?
Beyond the polite indication that I'm a male behind the avatar? No.



I want to take this a step further and state the typical counter-opinion.

Is it ok for women to objectify men? Because I will tell you right now that the female gender is no less guilty for doing so than men are. Yet for some odd reason this becomes a rights issue when women are concerned.

Square Enix does a very good job of keeping sexuality in a good place in their productions. It's there, but it isn't the primary focus. And given the fact that they've created genders for the races that did not have them before, it's a safe bet to say they're taking gender equality fairly seriously.

Now if only they could be more forward-minded with LGBT then they would be my favorite company regarding such things.

[Leira_Raine]

- Are you concerned about female objectification?

Oh, man. Just having gone through gender and naturalism in my class, I could NOT ignore this topic, even though my brain does not exactly want to cooperate with me.

First of all, no. I am not concerned about female objectification. Gaze through SE's perspective and ask yourself this: What is their goal? To make people hot-blooded and feel flustered while playing?

It's all for the aesthetic. A lot of male outfits are a tad "skimpy," but no one really mentions that. Honestly, I know they are simply avatars and what they wear does not bother me. For all I care, the avatars can battle nude (though it would be odd), and it would not faze me in the slightest.

So yes, I am not concerned at all. They're not using "sexy" miqo'te to sell the game, after all.

- Are you concerned with how far the FFXIV team will go with sexism?

It has been said that sex sells. To a point, it is true. However, sex does not have to be the solution to selling millions of copies. Their marketing has been more video-related, and I highly doubt they will work with the whole sex sells marketing ploy, unlike some other games (I'm looking at you, TERA).

- Does it in any way effect your enjoyment of the game?

Does not affect me in the slightest. I enjoy the game, and sometimes it is a little fun to put on the "skimpy" outfits and just run around giggling. But there just aren't enough of those types of outfits to cause me to be anti about it. I mean, if that is all there is for the female characters, I probably would have a slight issue about it (though it does contradict my earlier statement). Some of those outfits are, once again, just for fun.

- Has it ever effected how you have been treated as a female avatar?

Hrm, it really has not affected me. Then again, people don't truly pay attention to female midlander hyurs as much as miqo'tes. I have been treated with respect, especially as an LS leader, and nothing BUT respect. I mean, yes sometimes we all don skimpy outfits and ask each other what we think, but it's just for fun, once again.

Not only that but I have not seen it happen among my other friends.

Guess that is about it. I thought I had WAY more to say, but guess my brain really is shot.