Open Letter to the Devs Regarding Eden's Verse: Reflugence [Spoilers]

[heiligeharmonie]

I'm just going to preface this with the admission that I do not frequent the forums much, so I don't know what it takes to get the community team's attention, but I'm just going to shoot my shot.

________________

My name is Ariel, and I’d like to start out by saying, I’ve been playing Final Fantasy XIV since August 2013--since 2.0 launched. And in all this time, I’ve never been one to complain much about the game itself. I always try to be understanding of things like limitations of budget, time, horrendous base code, potential cultural differences corporate interference, and just the nature of trying new ideas.

That said, I think using Ryne’s head on Eden Shiva was not a good decision. Ysayle’s face would have been a better route to take. Not only would that have gotten a more powerful emotional reaction from the players when seeing Shiva again, it would make the Savage Phase 2 form more meaningful. And you would not have this literal child’s face on what appears to be an adult woman’s body, wearing outfits that start with a rather deep neckline, to one that plunges so far you might not even call it a neckline anymore, to...all of what Savage phase 2 is.

The character/monster designs and the fight design are actually really cool. But the conflict between the body design and Ryne’s face really distracts from that, and that’s a shame. For example, my own reaction to seeing that pre-fight scene upon entering the instance was, “Oooh, I want to cosplay thaaaaat’s Ryne’s baby face on cleavage [cringe].” I couldn't enjoy the fight because I was too busy thinking, "YIKES," over and over, especially on every Redress mechanic. I'm still not sure if I want to go back in or not because of how uncomfortable it made me.

What’s worse is that there are already some...less mature members of the community who have begun making unsavory jokes and comments about her (with artwork likely to come), which wouldn’t make my skin crawl if it weren’t Ryne’s face. Before Shadowbringers even launched, there were multiple people (myself included) who made comments on social platforms like, “If you lewd the baby Minfilia, we will decimate your entire bloodline,” because...we're, you know, not too fond of pedophilia. And I know she's just fictitious pixels, but she's still a depiction of a child. We’d already seen people sexually objectify Alphinaud and Alisaie in the past, so we knew it could happen, and the original Minfilia has also been an object of sexual fantasy. But she’s an adult character. Ryne is not. And putting her head on an adult body, whether you intended it to or not, invites that kind of behavior from some people. At best, it would fall into a shady grey area but, at least to me, it’s still really not okay.

Using a different head would have avoided a visual connection between this Shiva appearance and Ryne, even though Ryne is the “vessel.” Ideally, a different voice would also have been used, but the visual is significantly more powerful than the audial. It would not lessen the motivation Ryne, because we still know she is in there, it might slightly detract from the significance Hydaelyn-themed form, but I feel like that's a small price to pay to make the whole thing less cringe-worthy.

It’s not too late to sever the visual connection, so I do hope you will consider altering Eden Shiva’s models to use Ysayle’s head.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

[SilverObi]

Yikes.

/10char

[MomomiMomi]

I cringed.


Also, nothing can stop Ryne from being lewded. It's a thing since the moment she was revealed. There's this thing called rule 34 that is quite a reality.

[NessaWyvern]

If you think that’s bad, do the Ivalice raids. Past-Alma looks even younger than Ryne, she’s pregnant, and the father looks like he is in his mid 20s-30s

[Malmstrom]

Oh look, this thread again.

[ShenDrakar]

But, but without it, we will never have the chance to slap the anoying Ryne in the face. ^^

[rance-sama]

Someone tl;dr me.

[Mesarthim]

Someone tl;dr me.

People can't stop getting offended over things most people don't actually care about.

[rance-sama]

People can't stop getting offended over things most people don't actually care about.

Sounds like the usual.

[Darkpaw]

That seems more like a fixation of your own mindset rather than something that the devs should intervene with. Yes, you made valid points but at the same time. I went into refulgence and the first thing i thought of wasnt a sexualization of Ryne on Shivas body, all i could focus on was staying alive, doing mechanics, and enjoying the gorgeous field they created for the field. The next thing I focused on was the several different lore references that were there.

Like the references to Hydaelyn and how Ryne being the oracle of light altered Shiva’s abilities and mixed it with what we know of the battle between Hydaelyn and Zodiark.

You can’t stop people’s personal thoughts and fantasies but there is one thing very much in your power to do. Ignore it, block it out, don’t go looking for these things that will be out there in the internet. If it disturbs you, as for the fight itself and your feelings, there are two ways to go, continue farming for gear and try to force yourself not to think about it and focus on other aspects of the fight or.. don’t.

To ask the devs to do this is like asking game developers to stop making sonic games because of the lewd communities out there. It shouldn’t limit their creativity because the internet exists.