Au'ra

[Kolsykol]

Male characters are taller = people get mad.

Male characters are shorter = people get mad.

Both are equally tall = ... Ofc people would get mad.


It's funny tho how quickly the narrative shifts.
First everyone seems fairly onboard with the idea of Male Viera being smaller, then suddenly when it ends up being true the narrative shifts and suddenly no wait.

I doubt it. As a gay guy myself I've found that many gay men want to play tall, conventionally attractive handsome men. A lot of the people who fawn over overly feminine men actually turn out to be 'fujoshi' - women who obsess over the idea of gay men but project their feminity into the relationship and as such end up pushing stuff that a lot of actual gay men dislike. Such as negative stereotypes, abusive relationships and so on.

Many of those pushing for feminine aesthetics to be glorified are neither male or gay, generally speaking. Exceptions do exist, of course, but contrary to what social media and the regular media implies the majority of gay men do not actually conform to the stereotypes pushed by either platform.

Let's not forget, a not insignificant number of people were asking for male viera to have options to be taller, beefier and more masculine. Evidence of such can be found throughout the various male viera threads. I think it's telling that the thread died shortly after the official reveal was put forward - they'll not be as niche as, say, female roegadyn but I doubt they'll become the most popular male racial pick. At least not where the European servers are concerned based on current trends.

I blame media depictions and quite frankly a very vocal group in the LGBT community.
Look at most Pride events and it does lean VERY heavily into that.
Basically most of what people see of gay men are men who are very Feminine.
It's actually very rare that people are exposed to men who they know are gay that aren't Feminine so people end up with the idea that gay men are all flamboyant as hell.

I mean there's nothing wrong with being like that, but it's a bit weird that it's all you see.
I think a lot of it also has to do with the monetization of it too, it's a lot more out there and draws more attention which is good for marketing and companies view everything from the lens of stereotypes.

It's interesting that you bring up Fujoshi tho because people always harp on about '' the male gaze ''.
But when I think of depictions of gay men it very much comes across as '' the female gaze '', it's almost treated as a fetish.
Male K-pop idol comes to mind as a pretty good example of that.

[Terin]

I vaguely recall a possibly giant thread about this back in HW when the race was introduced. It basically boiled down to using the gender differences to allow players to either have a fierce and powerful looking character or something soft and cute. The only complaint I really have at this point is there wasn't a race that essentially flipped this later by having tall fierce powerful looking females with small soft cute males.

I honestly wish this had been the case with Viera. Have the "males" between Miqo'te and Lalafel's. Sort of like perpetual teenagers, I thought that would've been a fun counter-balance, not to mention fill a bit of a void. Almost like the Ivalice-Moogles in height (maybe a *tad* taller), but personality wise have them a little more playful generally.

[Lauront]

Male characters are taller = people get mad.

Male characters are shorter = people get mad.

Both are equally tall = ... Ofc people would get mad.


It's funny tho how quickly the narrative shifts.
First everyone seems fairly onboard with the idea of Male Viera being smaller, then suddenly when it ends up being true the narrative shifts and suddenly no wait.

A correction on that point - there was very frequent debate on that in the main thread requesting them. A lot of people thought having them at the same height, or with a broader slider (similar to what femroes have), would be an acceptable compromise, so you could take them quite short at the minimum of the range but close to elezen men at the max. I think it'd have been a good compromise.

I blame media depictions and quite frankly a very vocal group in the LGBT community.
Look at most Pride events and it does lean VERY heavily into that.
Basically most of what people see of gay men are men who are very Feminine.
It's actually very rare that people are exposed to men who they know are gay that aren't Feminine so people end up with the idea that gay men are all flamboyant as hell.

I mean there's nothing wrong with being like that, but it's a bit weird that it's all you see.
I think a lot of it also has to do with the monetization of it too, it's a lot more out there and draws more attention which is good for marketing and companies view everything from the lens of stereotypes.

It's interesting that you bring up Fujoshi tho because people always harp on about '' the male gaze ''.
But when I think of depictions of gay men it very much comes across as '' the female gaze '', it's almost treated as a fetish.
Male K-pop idol comes to mind as a pretty good example of that.

Could be a US thing. It's definitely not as common here in Europe in terms of media exposure, although obviously it exists to some degree, but yes it is the most "visible" part coming from the so-called gay community so of course people create the mental association. Personally, I find it grating and want little association with it.

[KizuyaKatogami]

I blame media depictions and quite frankly a very vocal group in the LGBT community.
Look at most Pride events and it does lean VERY heavily into that.
Basically most of what people see of gay men are men who are very Feminine.
It's actually very rare that people are exposed to men who they know are gay that aren't Feminine so people end up with the idea that gay men are all flamboyant as hell.

I mean there's nothing wrong with being like that, but it's a bit weird that it's all you see.
I think a lot of it also has to do with the monetization of it too, it's a lot more out there and draws more attention which is good for marketing and companies view everything from the lens of stereotypes.

It's interesting that you bring up Fujoshi tho because people always harp on about '' the male gaze ''.
But when I think of depictions of gay men it very much comes across as '' the female gaze '', it's almost treated as a fetish.
Male K-pop idol comes to mind as a pretty good example of that.

This is sadly true. It seems like it was a loud minority of the twitter lgbt crowd pushing for it. Also seemed to have a lot of female character/players pushing for it as well so they could have their dominant stance on it. It’s just kind of gross and shitty that SE decided to look to that for inspiration instead of their very own guy who created viera in the first place and had an entire different vision for them. But in the end SE is a company and will do whatever gets them the most money. Just would’ve been nice for them to not be lazy and at least make the height slider varied so they could be smaller and taller at the same time to compromise. But nope gotta feed the fetishists.

[Tsiron]

Man, where were y'all when female Au Ra were showed off and then made it into the game the state they're in..? Oh wait, my bad! It's 100% okay when women are made into pathetic soft kawaii~ waifus, but heaven forbid male designs get that kind of treatment... I hope male Viera stay exactly as they are.

[KizuyaKatogami]

Man, where were y'all when female Au Ra were showed off and then made it into the game the state they're in..? Oh wait, my bad! It's 100% okay when women are made into pathetic soft kawaii~ waifus, but heaven forbid male designs get that kind of treatment... I hope male Viera stay exactly as they are.

First of all that’s insanely petty, second of all you at like it’d have done something. SE doesn’t care about us lmao. They care about making money. Unfortunately, small petite females are what a majority of the playerbase plays and it’s what sells. But sure go ahead and play the female vs male card.

[Ayuhra]

Man, where were y'all when female Au Ra were showed off and then made it into the game the state they're in..? Oh wait, my bad! It's 100% okay when women are made into pathetic soft kawaii~ waifus, but heaven forbid male designs get that kind of treatment... I hope male Viera stay exactly as they are.

We still need a third tribe of Au Ra that have tall, muscular women and small, delicate men.

It's always bothered me that with the clan system the Hyur are the only ones who get to change silhouette and general aesthetic. Everything else is a palette swap with maybe a couple different facial feature options here and there.

[KizuyaKatogami]

We still need a third tribe of Au Ra that have tall, muscular women and small, delicate men.

It's always bothered me that with the clan system the Hyur are the only ones who get to change silhouette and general aesthetic. Everything else is a palette swap with maybe a couple different facial feature options here and there.

We already have lalafell, why do we need small delicate men in the form of au ra? That wouldn’t really sell.

[Tsiron]

If you think lalafell (who literally look like toddlers) are what people want have I got news for you...

[BaconBits]

We already have lalafell, why do we need small delicate men in the form of au ra? That wouldn’t really sell.

As much as I like Lalafell, it would be nice to have a second option for short races.

Though I'd rather have a race that's short all around than having one gender being far shorter than the other. Thank God the crowd that wanted Male Viera to be as dainty as fem Au Ra didn't get exactly what they wanted.