VIERA AND HROTHGAR COMPLAINT MEGATHREAD

[Senn]

If I'm not mistaken, in the live where he said about not having male Vieras because he wanted a more bestial race for the game, he also said that male Vieras in lore had never appeared in the game, because they were recluses. But wait a minute, didn't he create a world where everything was filled with light? Did the Viera men and the Hrothgar women flee to the moon, too, to be alone?

Sometimes the ffxiv team tries to make lore fit around the game's development. For example, when ffxiv was getting remade, the team very cleverly created an end of the world scenario that would explain away why the world suddenly changed so much. It's sort of the same thing with viera and hrothgar. Since the graphics team tried to appease both the viera and beastly race wanters, and didn't plan on making the other genders at the time, they came up with a lore reason as to why male viera and female hrothgar were not shown in the game. We know the real reason there was a lack of male viera and female hrothgar was the graphic team's work flow.

In the post created to ask for male Viera, I remember someone posting an interview where Yoshi P said that a rabbit man would be weird. A rabbit man is weird, but a rabbit woman wearing underwear for armor is ok...

Yeah, Yoshi P did say that. But in his defense, he probably didn't have a mental image of what male viera would look like. Some fan artwork that was floating around was of super burly macho men with cute little rabbit ears, and to be honest, that does look a bit silly and weird to me. Or perhaps he was envisioning a more beastly type of rabbit race which would also be weird. Some concepts look aesthetically pleasing, and some just look off. It is what it is.

People also said that he himself said that there would never be a genderlock race again, when he remade the game with male miqo'te and female roe. Lie.

Yoshi P didn't necessarily say there would never be a genderlock again, but he said the lack of male miqo'te and female roegadyn was a problem, and that he wanted all races to have a male and female option available as a sort of fresh start for ARR.

MAC: In adding female Roegadyn and male Miqo'te into Final Fantasy XIV, how are you going to explain adding them in? Any other new changes to the races in game?

NY: The lack of female Roegadyn and male Miqo'te was a problem from the beginning. Rather than emphasizing the reason for introducing them, we're seeing it as a way to start fresh with every race having a male and female option available. While we are not considering new playable races until future expansion packs, A Realm Reborn will feature many more options for character customization.

Source

I wouldn't call it a lie, just a change of plans. But in the end, we are getting the missing genders, so I don't really see the issue.

And even though they wanted a bestial race in the game, if the company made the slightest effort to get to know their players, they would know that Viera would be more popular than Hrothgar by far.

You know, this same argument was used against having a slim and elegant body type for male viera. A few people wanted male viera to look "classically handsome" - typical masculine facial features and physique based on western tastes. I was constantly told by the same few people that I was in the "vocal minority", and viera would be more popular if they were big and buff instead of elegant and slim. And don't even get me started on male viera's height in comparison to the females... What I'm trying to say is that while popularity is important when considering races and customization options in general, it shouldn't be the only deciding factor. There was still a sizable population of people who really wanted a beast race, and even if they weren't in the majority, the developers wanted to cater to them as well.

But the reality here is one: if they had only made ONE of the races, no one would complain. Perhaps if Hrothgar was chosen, some people would talk about the Vieras, but the matter would die quickly, as we already had the miqo'te. I myself only went after lore about Vieras and fell in love with them after it was announced on SHB.

I don't really understand. Did you want the graphics team to only work on one race? I believe the reason we're even getting male viera and female hrothgar is because people are requesting for the missing genders to be included. So the pressure, for a lack of a better word, is on the developers to include what is missing. But if nothing is "missing", or rather, if only male and female hrothgar were released for example, I don't think we would be seeing viera at all. So I think releasing male hrothgar and female viera was a blessing in disguise.

The franchise has never had a male Viera, because they just want to show the hot women.

Yeah lol

And even though I've never played another game in the franchise, I'd venture to say that the Hrothgar women may never have had a prominent place in the stories, correct me if I'm wrong.

Hrothgars are based off of Ronso from ffx. The females didn't really have a promiment role in the story.

[Adamantini]

Yoshi P didn't necessarily say there would never be a genderlock again, but he said the lack of male miqo'te and female roegadyn was a problem, and that he wanted all races to have a male and female option available as a sort of fresh start for ARR.

MAC: In adding female Roegadyn and male Miqo'te into Final Fantasy XIV, how are you going to explain adding them in? Any other new changes to the races in game?

NY: The lack of female Roegadyn and male Miqo'te was a problem from the beginning. Rather than emphasizing the reason for introducing them, we're seeing it as a way to start fresh with every race having a male and female option available. While we are not considering new playable races until future expansion packs, A Realm Reborn will feature many more options for character customization.

Source

I wouldn't call it a lie, just a change of plans. But in the end, we are getting the missing genders, so I don't really see the issue.

thanks for the correction and source. But there's no issue here, I'm just saying the reason for my thinking.

(...) There was still a sizable population of people who really wanted a beast race, and even if they weren't in the majority, the developers wanted to cater to them as well.

(...)I don't really understand. Did you want the graphics team to only work on one race? I believe the reason we're even getting male viera and female hrothgar is because people are requesting for the missing genders to be included. So the pressure, for a lack of a better word, is on the developers to include what is missing. But if nothing is "missing", or rather, if only male and female hrothgar were released for example, I don't think we would be seeing viera at all. So I think releasing male hrothgar and female viera was a blessing in disguise.

for both quotes, the same answer: If they had chosen just one race, and made it all the way through, we would be much happier at the moment.

I'm not saying they should abandon one of the races for the moment and focus on just one, I'm saying they should have made one in the beginning, and although there was a risk that Vieras would never exist, the dissatisfaction would be less since we wouldn't be losing anything.

But that wasn't done, and now they have to admit they made a mistake and fix it. Excuses won't make the races complete, quite the opposite. 3 years waiting for something, and the neglect with the Hrothgar is more than clear. The race they wanted so badly to put in the game is the worst there is in terms of limitations.

[Senn]

I'm not saying they should abandon one of the races for the moment and focus on just one, I'm saying they should have made one in the beginning, and although there was a risk that Vieras would never exist, the dissatisfaction would be less since we wouldn't be losing anything.

But that wasn't done, and now they have to admit they made a mistake and fix it. Excuses won't make the races complete, quite the opposite. 3 years waiting for something, and the neglect with the Hrothgar is more than clear. The race they wanted so badly to put in the game is the worst there is in terms of limitations.

Ehh I don't know. I'm glad that male hrothgar and female viera were released together since it paved the way for the missing genders. If it's a choice between hrothgar having all head gear & hair in exchange for viera never existing or our current situation, I would definitely pick the latter. However, I do think the hair issue with hrothgar needs to be addressed. Like you said, hrothgar has it the worst right now.

[Milus]

Nah male viera are fine, femboy representation is necessary, I just wanted to meme.

[hfang]

femboy representation is necessary

were miqo'te, elezen and midlander not enough? we needed another one?

[Senn]

were miqo'te, elezen and midlander not enough? we needed another one?

Miqo'te, elezen, and midlander aren't feminine though. Before male viera were a thing, I always thought there was a lack of elegant male options. So I'm glad we got a slim and elegant character model for males.
And I think ffxiv has a decent amount of masculine looking races (male au ra, highlander, roegadyn, hrothgar, and midlander depending on how you customize them)
I don't really consider elezen an option because their proportions are not good in my opinion, and a lot of people think this as well.

[Milus]

were miqo'te, elezen and midlander not enough? we needed another one?

I said femboy, not twinks, mr. tall twink.

[Kazhar]

were miqo'te, elezen and midlander not enough? we needed another one?

All of those look boyish, but not really feminine. At the very least, they don't fill the same ultra feminine Amano look of the earlier FF as well as Male Viera do.

[XiRon]

thing about mviera for me is we know the existing viera and hrothgar lost more options for them.
We know because the design team worked on mviera in between projects in the middle of shb
Shb. Wherein viera and hrothgar were first made playable.
They COULD have been working on making it so hrothgar didnt have to buy fantasia to change their look, they COULD have been making all the new gear and hair in shb fit these two races, and elected not too because fans thought ANOTHER kneecaped race was what the game needed instead of fixing the existing issues viera and hrothgar had.
And theres also the fact that female hrothgar...dont exist. Despite every male hroth in the game having sad man dead wife disease. Why did they release mviera separately?
Are hrothgar still gonna be screwed in 7.57 when they finally deign to show a single 144p still print out of 1 female hrothgar face? Do hrothgar get to enjoy two more expansions wondering if today, maybe today, they'll get new things that arent a punch in the groin? I wish we knew any of these things, and I super wish the devs prioritized the races they added 3 years ago a little more, and equally, because hrothgar have 3 hair options in CC while viera have 21.
Oh sorry, I forgot they made the hrothgar hair toggles separate styles, my bad. 5 to 21, that seems super fair to me.
No hate on mviera really but the effort put into a new male option, made in the middle of an expac, when one race still cant use all of its base racial hairs really grates on me.

[Senn]

thing about mviera for me is we know the existing viera and hrothgar lost more options for them.
We know because the design team worked on mviera in between projects in the middle of shb
Shb. Wherein viera and hrothgar were first made playable.
They COULD have been working on making it so hrothgar didnt have to buy fantasia to change their look, they COULD have been making all the new gear and hair in shb fit these two races, and elected not too because fans thought ANOTHER kneecaped race was what the game needed instead of fixing the existing issues viera and hrothgar had.
And theres also the fact that female hrothgar...dont exist. Despite every male hroth in the game having sad man dead wife disease. Why did they release mviera separately?
Are hrothgar still gonna be screwed in 7.57 when they finally deign to show a single 144p still print out of 1 female hrothgar face? Do hrothgar get to enjoy two more expansions wondering if today, maybe today, they'll get new things that arent a punch in the groin? I wish we knew any of these things, and I super wish the devs prioritized the races they added 3 years ago a little more, and equally, because hrothgar have 3 hair options in CC while viera have 21.
Oh sorry, I forgot they made the hrothgar hair toggles separate styles, my bad. 5 to 21, that seems super fair to me.
No hate on mviera really but the effort put into a new male option, made in the middle of an expac, when one race still cant use all of its base racial hairs really grates on me.

I don't really know what the graphic team's work flow is like, but perhaps it would be more efficient to fit and adjust head gear and hairstyles for hrothgar when both genders are out (since I assume they would have similar head shapes) rather than doing it one at a time. But maybe this is just wishful thinking.