Dragon's Crown: Gaze past the giant witch tits

[Dewar]

Not getting involved in this conversation one way or another, but I would say that some of the hyper muscled loincloth wearing male characters out there make me (a male) a bit uncomfortable at times. Zangief tops my mind at this moment.

[TheLastBaron]

Not getting involved in this conversation one way or another, but I would say that some of the hyper muscled loincloth wearing male characters out there make me (a male) a bit uncomfortable at times. Zangief tops my mind at this moment.

 

 

I don't see anything wrong

[I_smell]

I also found it totally hilarious and was on-board the first time I saw it, but after a while I couldn't deny that the designer's intention of laffs were second priority to his intention of it being total wank-bait.

 

 

EDIT- I am not talking about Zangief in this post.

[osmosisch]

I'm fairly certain I didn't say that.

I can't read your last couple posts as meaning something else than that the witch is the only female character with exaggerated sexual traits.

[Twig]

Considering I said the point of ALL the designs was to exaggerate the fuck out of everything, I have no idea how you reached that utterly bizarre conclusion? What?

[osmosisch]

I said:

The exaggerated parts of the women are the sexual characteristics, so people complaining about creepy sexism is hardly unwarranted.

 

Then you said:

On one out of six characters is that actually true.

 

It doesn't apply to the barbarian lady. I mean c'mon, for real here, c'mon.

 

Again, I have no idea how else to read that. But whatever, I cannot see past the witch tits. I have failed the thread challenge.

[Tanukitsune]

You haven't seen Sakura Oogami from Dangan Ronpa, haven't you? 

[Twig]

I said:

The exaggerated parts of the women are the sexual characteristics, so people complaining about creepy sexism is hardly unwarranted.

 

Then you said:

On one out of six characters is that actually true.

 

It doesn't apply to the barbarian lady. I mean c'mon, for real here, c'mon.

 

Again, I have no idea how else to read that. But whatever, I cannot see past the witch tits. I have failed the thread challenge.

Oh, I see. I wasn't responding to you with that post. I would've quoted you, if I was. There's a post between ours. Sorry. I get it now. I WILL EXPLAIN. U:

 

It - that is, the post I was responding to - doesn't apply to the barbarian lady because it's not exaggeration of "the most typical ... thing". Typical female exaggeration does not result in an undeniably-socially-not-considered-attractive-butt-bigger-than-rest-of-body. The typical way is skinny but very curvy, with enormous breasts. Liiiiike, witch lady.  Barbarian lady, on the other hand... not really skinny, definitely curvy, definitely a sexual part, but all in in the "wrong" way. Pretty obviously, from where I'm standing, NOT intended to be titillating.

 

SHRUG

[osmosisch]

Well I disagree what with the jiggling chest and derriere, but at least we understand each other now. 

[miffy495]

You haven't seen Sakura Oogami from Dangan Ronpa, haven't you? 

 

 

I don't get how saying that something else is worse makes this not bad. As for saying hyper-muscled characters bothers you, I'm pretty sure people have explained false equivalence about a million times on this forum and it's been said better in the past, so look up an old post with that term if you think that saying the men are exaggerated too is an excuse.

 

Look, I'm not going to say the game will be bad. Hell, for all it's character design and creepy male gaze problems, the deep mechanics and crazy situations of Bayonetta actually won me over and I liked it. I still felt creepy and gross whenever the camera lingered super long on her ass, or the character got naked for a special attack for no reason beyond "hey, now she's naked!". Ditto Miranda in Mass Effect. I love the Mass Effect games, they are some of my favourite games of this generation of consoles (even though I played them on PC...), but a lot of the way that it treats certain (female) characters is really problematic. I think that's a lot of what those of us who are bothered by this are really trying to say. At least it's all that I, personally, hope some of the defenders are taking away from this. The game may be one of the best-playing things released this year, who knows? That doesn't make the choices it makes in it's character designs less sexualized, leering, and problematic. There's nothing wrong with loving a game with problematic aspects, I do too, but you need to admit that there are some creepy parts of this worth discussing. No game, no matter how good, is beyond reproach for doing this shit over and over again.

 

Finally, as Argobot said, there's nothing wrong with designing your characters to be busty, thin, whatever. People are busty, thin, whatever in real life too. A variety of designs would be nice. Looking at the women in this game, I see two massive pairs of breasts and asses with tiny waists between them, and one (not quite as pandering, but still in pigtails and short-shorts) waif for those who are grasping at straws to defend the first two. THIS IS NOT A JUDGEMENT OF THE GAME, it is a judgement of the design. The design creeps me the fuck out. If the game is fantastic, I may try to, as you suggest, gaze past the witch tits, but it will take a HELL of a groundswell of support from critics and fellow forumers I have a lot of respect for in order for me to even attempt to get past this design.

[tegan]

Tanukitsune linked to this comic earlier but I think it deserves to be posted in-thread.

 

 

[Twig]

That comic doesn't really work, though. If I ever met a dude who was made uncomfortable by that or anything like it, I'd probably laugh under the assumption that he was joking. Then he'd explain to me that he was serious. And I'd laugh more. U:

 

What I'm saying is I sincerely doubt I'd ever find a dude who was legit bothered by something like that. Although, then again, I don't seek out Bros, and I suppose they're the most likely bunch.

 

Well I disagree what with the jiggling chest and derriere, but at least we understand each other now. 

Fat jiggles. Hell, even muscle jiggles, when it's that big! Frankly, it'd look weird if it didn't, what with how detailed their animations tend to be. You ever seen a fat dude walkin' down the street? Jiggle, jiggle, man. Hell, I jiggle. JIGGLE!

 

man that word just got really fun to say for me

 

I get what you're saying, though. I just don't know how you find that attractive. THERE. I SAID IT. It's so utterly unnatural.

[miffy495]

Just because you're not attracted to it doesn't mean that it isn't intended to attract.

[Twig]

For sure. I still believe what I say. It wasn't intended to. It was intended to be incredibly disproportionate in the Buttocks Region.

[tegan]

That comic doesn't really work, though. If I ever met a dude who was made uncomfortable by that or anything like it, I'd probably laugh under the assumption that he was joking. Then he'd explain to me that he was serious. And I'd laugh more. U:

 

What I'm saying is I sincerely doubt I'd ever find a dude who was legit bothered by something like that. Although, then again, I don't seek out Bros, and I suppose they're the most likely bunch.

 

Okay, alternative proposal: every male video game character now wears tight shorts with a noticeable crotch bulge with jiggle physics; which is never ever off-camera.

 

 

(tegan has no idea what straight girls find attractive. The management is not responsible for tegan being dumb)

[Twig]

I'd laugh still. U:

 

Jiggle physics in general makes me laugh, though, so that probably wasn't the best alternative proposal to prove your point! (Obviously I am in no way saying my finding humor in stupid shit invalidates someone else being offended. I find every goddamn thing in the world funny in the right context.)

[Ucantalas]

Also just have armor that is nothing more than a chain-mail banana-hammock.

[Gormongous]

Also just have armor that is nothing more than a chain-mail banana-hammock.

 

Hey, it protects the really important stuff, don't it?

[Zeusthecat]

(Obviously I am in no way saying my finding humor in stupid shit invalidates someone else being offended. I find every goddamn thing in the world funny in the right context.)

 

Even though I'm on the side that is turned off by this design, I agree with this statement. I find myself laughing at just about everything, laughing is great.

 

The problem with the design is that they didn't go far enough into the absurd with the proportions and jiggle. They should have implemented harmonic frequencies on the boobies and booties so that a breeze would cause the jiggle to grow exponentially. And the proportions? Well, they should have gone much larger, something like this:

 

Yeah, I drew that. I wanted to properly end my stay at 69 posts and this seemed most fitting.

[Sno]

I was just catching up on this thread and was going to try to add something meaningful to the conversation, but i don't think i can after seeing the above post.

[Ucantalas]

I laughed much harder than I probably should have.

[Zeusthecat]

I just tried to bring the conversation to it's logical conclusion where both sides can meet in the middle. I think we all should agree that that is about the level of exaggeration that makes it appropriate to use the big tits and ass art style.

[Tanukitsune]

Are we even taking sides anymore? Are there even sides anymore? Most of the comments now just seems to be "LOL BOOBS!", only some of us are laughing at them, while other are laughing with them? *shrugs*

 

[Argobot]

I'd say that the laughter (whether it's with the boobs or against them) is what really bothers about this character design and others like it.

 

It's like when an overweight person is portrayed in animation: their weight is usually meant to be comical, and the audience's reaction to the overweight person's body is generally 'haha, look at fatty.' Now most intelligent, compassionate people can separate the animated from reality and won't go around laughing at overweight people in the real world, but a lot of people can't do that. Overweight bodies have become a cultural shorthand for humor, and bigger breasts have been given the same meaning. And there are real women with larger cup sizes that are watching these animations and seeing everyone laughing at the 'balloon tits' and it's insulting.

 

None of these body shapes exist in a vacuum; they exist in a culture where many, many people assume certain things about other people's bodies (fat = funny or lazy, large breasts = funny or slutty, etc.) and to ignore that when discussing things like Dragon's Crown is unfair. I wish that if a character is designed with big breasts that the breasts wouldn't become a joke; I wish they could just be present and not have any one comment or offer what their opinion of said breasts are. But that's not the society we live in, and until boobs can just be boobs, I'm always going to be bothered by things like Dragon's Crown.

[Sententia]

I don't have any conclusions to offer but I'll put this out as an observation: I have no problem when characters are sexualized, male or female.  It's weird that sexualization and objectification are often tied together and it's unfortunate that some people take social cues, whether subconscious or not, from these media.

 

I think it's more relevant to talk about character complexity which is currently heavily weighted towards male characters, females mostly playing shallow roles or one-shot jokes.  This is reflected in the art and animation of games as well as the writing, the two usually go hand in hand but don't necessarily need to, you can have a sexy female with a fleshed out role.  In regards to this specific game I'd bet all of the characters, males included, will be little more than meat-suits for the player to inhabit so I don't really take issue with the difference in physical representation.  From a design standpoint it seems to me these are all different so that the silhouettes are easily discernible.