Dear Toriyama,

I'd say that it's different people say these things but I've encountered plenty of people who will make both arguments, so yeah[DOUBLEPOST=1395180649][/DOUBLEPOST]

It's a fair bit more complex than that

 

It ain't even the best of the SNES ones, son.

 

Well let's see
it's better than FF4, for sure, that ages horribly
definitely better than Mystic Quest
FF5 I guess you could make the argument.
I already said the Ivalice games have better story, but gameplay... not so much
And there aren't any other ones worth mentioning
so yeah
FF6
best one

 

VI was way too simple and easy to be considered good in the strictly game section. FFV beats it by far in that aspect. The main cast are shallow and uninteresting, outside of Sabin and Edgar, FFIV beats it in both characters and story.

In all honesty, FFVI just feels unfocused. It would have probably been a lot better if they had a smaller main cast.

 

This is cherrypicking. You have taken the most extreme example from each series while ignoring the rest.
Soul Calibur

Spoiler

[/img]http://www.fightersgeneration.com/characters3/sciv12.jpg[/img]

Sengoku Basara

Spoiler

Ninja Gaiden/DoA as they are both using the same characters anywho

Spoiler

Dragons Crown

Spoiler

Dragons Crown might I add along with every other Vanillaware game is built aesthetically around being as exaggerated as possible for both male and females.

While Bayonetta does have Jeanne

Spoiler

Bayonetta is indeed super sexual, however Bayonetta the game is built largely on flash, glammer and like Dragons Crown being as ridiculous as possible. This is something that exists upon thousands upon thousands of works.

Metal Gear Solid

Spoiler

That picture of Serah isn't even sexualized. It's literally just her not wearing a top. She doesn't even go through the game topless.
XIII-2

Spoiler

And of course Lightning

Spoiler

The only reason you chose what you chose above is because those are the kind of things that social media and other so call "game journalist" like to draw the most attention to. They go digging for all the sexualization they can find and throw it in your face yelling "HEY LOOK! ISN'T THIS BAD!? THOSE JAPANESE SURE ARE SICK HUH!?" only when it suits their interest.

Meanwhile here in the West we have Mortal Kombat, the most popular western fighting game of all time.

Spoiler

Skullgirls

Spoiler

Hell I can't even post Duke Nukem since that's just NSFW period, a game riddled with hyper sexualized girls that I can pay to dance for me AND Aliens and there was enough hype around Forever to take out a hype train.

But as I said, people don't want to bring up those examples in fear of having thier respective culture look bad, but when it comes to Japanese game number 503 having a girl wearing a bikini? LOOK LOOK! THIS IS WHAT ALL JAPANESE GAMES ARE EVERYONE!


It's easy to paint a generalization of a society when you focus only on extremes.

Well that sounds to me like an opinion
Believe it or not, some people don't think it's cool when Duke Nukem goes "I've got balls of steel" after blowing an enemies head off. Regardless that doesn't defeat the fact that the point of the one liner is just to be a flashy cool thing the character says after killing an enemy. If you don't find it cool then whatever, but it's hardly the basis for "WHY THIS CHARACTER IS POORLY WRITTEN".

Games are allowed to appeal to whoever they want to appeal to.
You want a game about monkeys? There's those
You want a game about soup? There's that too
You want a game that focuses on story? There's tons of those
You want a game that's mindless blood and guts? I can hook you up.


When every game is trying to appeal to ever single human being on the planet is when things like Tomb Raider happen where Square-Enix shells out a gazillion dollars on advertising a game to absolutely everyone only to LOSE money instead of gaining it when people buy the game.
There are niches for everyone, go find them and play those games. There is no reason why every game in the world has to appeal to absolutely everyone. It's that kind of attitude that kills off niche games.

She can wear all KINDS of outfits. Have you even seen what her DEFAULT outfit is?


You are once again focusing on the most extreme examples while ignoring the rest.

Are you serious?
EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE HAS WEIRD FETISHIES!
EVER SEEN GERMAN PORN!?

The national age of consent in Angola is 12.
What the hell does this have to do with anything? It's called culture differences, a 13 year old in another country might be considered ready for sexual intercourse then a 13 year old in your country. Does this make sense to you? Of course it doesn't, YOU'VE BEEN RAISED IN A COUNTRY WITH A HIGHER AGE OF CONSENT AND THEREFORE WHAT YOU LEARN ABOUT SEX AND SEXUALITY IS BUILT AROUND THAT!

Once again, fetishes exist everywhere all the time no matter what. I HARDLY see why you're using PORN of all things as an example of generilzing a culture. Germans must love eating **** since scat is extremely popular over there.

That isn't even what an idol is. I can already tell that you're just pulling things out of your ass.

This has to be the single most silly thing you've said so far.
You're telling me the ability to watch (acted) rape has somehow turned people into rapist?
If you're raping people, it is HARDLY because some video suddenly just clicked off the empathy part in your brain and made you go "GOTTARAPEGOTTARAPEGOTTARAPE"

And once again, rape fetishes exist everywhere.

You have once again completely generalized a situation.
Birth rates in Japan are largely affected by the fact that it simply cost too much in Japan to take care of a child and any compensation programs that Japan might have quickly dwindled in recent years. Nowadays in Japan for a woman to have a baby means giving up her career and source of income which lots of Japanese women don't feel like doing.
They're are people who isolate themselves from society all over the world, once again people are only focusing on the worst possible examples.

And that is ignorant and you know it.
You have judged an entire society of people based on cartoons.


Face it, you don't know what you're talking about and are just parroting things you heard on the internet.
It's easy to look at another culture and say "This is what is wrong with said society" when you know so little about said society

 

I know the first game is great (which I think is good because I started with 3rd Birthday so going back will be better?) and I'm glad someone (you) explained the ending to me. Didn't know if she was her sister all along or became her sister then by going back in time. Ugh. 3rd Birthday makes my head hurt more than the Kingdom Hearts plot.​

 

FF5 is severely underrated for its superb gameplay, but it's somewhat lacking in areas outside of combat. FF4 for characters? Eh...? I kidna tuned them out after the fiftieth heroic sacrifice and shocking reveal that they survived. I certainly couldn't tell you a trait about Yang, Edge, Cid or Rosa, beyond the barest fragments of a stereotype they use to flavour their text. I'm hesitant to even call the characters of FF4 one note because I'm not sure they even manage to hit that note. Certainly nobody terribly multifaceted. I mean, what do we know about Cecil? Like REEEAALLLY know?
FF6 is definitely unfocused, especially the second half, but at the very least the characters were distinct enough that I could list a few traits about them. FF6 gets bonus points for having scenes that you'll never see anything like in any other game, too

 

As a globalised community, we have to be accountable to each other. Especially for Japan,, whose business relies extremely on foreign trade, their exports are one of the biggest causes of growth in their economy. I live in London, a cultural melting pot and we have issues with traditions of other countries leaking into ours and yadda yadda bull stuff. Games have to be accountable no matter where they come from, and especially when they're internationally available.

And there are constant debates and outcries about the gun laws in America, where thousands a year are killed by guns or in Europe where 'Neck-nominations' recently killed a handful of people who poisoned themselves on overconsumption alcohol. If you read that article about sex and violence, you'll see the increase and normality of violence against women in such countries where exposure to media, and specifically porn here, correlates with each other. I will call out bull when I see it, and this is something I see plenty of. I liked Suda 51 till his release of Killer is Dead, which had the main character seduce a girl at a bar by staring at her breasts when she wasn't looking and buying her diamonds or **** an then sleeping with her, getting an upgrade of something before moving on to a new girl. I liked his concept ideas of the Alice in Wonderland world that I saw, but after that I just couldn't respect him designing the game. Not purely because it's sexist, but also because it's ripping off porn flash game available since early noughties. Like Flappy Birds being considered and original idea.

I never said that any western game was exempt or right. Lara Croft has been reimagined form her original sex symbolish self, but for her time she was an icon of a female character fighting back and as the lead character. She still holds that even in the latest game. Grand Theft Auto has also shown many, many varieties of women, and actually i'd argue has some of the most grounded female characters in gaming. Of course some are hyper realised versions of stereotypical American society cliches of women, but thinking of Katie McCreary or Kendra and I see some good characters there.

I wouldn't say women are less prevalent, i'd say silent protagonist or create your own protagonists are. Fallout, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, are western RPGs that allow you to be who you want, that means as a man or woman, an equal match there. Even in the bromance of Gears of War, we had about three female playable characters in the third game. Remember Me, as much as I dislike it, showed off a female character as the lead with building control over her own life as the story progresses. CoD allows female avatars to use in multiplayer now. Like I said, almost half of online gamers are women now, though I should point ut those are stats for North America. The west has progressed a lot in the last 10 or so years.

It's badass because it made it in the game? The meaning lacks clarity and is just not a great line. If I say 'Fate is Fate' it's pretty weak. I mean I thought it was saying how bad destiny is or something, since Lightning is suppose to be fighting against it, but if we both don't know then something's wrong. Even 'Destiny must fail' would've been better, since it gets the point across clearer in the same amount of words.

So big companies should stick to the brodude mould of shooters and every male playable character should somehow have a name relating to stones? Indies are being praised for their willingness to push stuff, and the more we fund and love indie games doing these changes, the bigger companies will have to take notice, and design their games accordingly. We should not just accept the stagnation of the industry, we should be pushing it.

According to a pole of white men in their 20s? Because that's the demographic of FF7 players in the west I believe.

Bit sexist to say, but that reinforces my point. If all women see are skimpy role models, that's what they'll try to copy. If they were shown a greater variety, there might be more women you'd see who aren't socialised to just be that.
Yes, but their fetishes are more mainstream and popular than in the west. Our society's religious persecution compared to their lax of religious constraint on the matter of sex has allowed them to develop as such, according to some theorist of Shinto vs Christianity restrictions.

I said i'd be more willing to let her fetish outfits slide if she had some real depth of character, but she doesn't so I can only see her as a character exploited as a sexual object. She's another nail in that she's another half arsed character made to wear stuff that appeals to blokes and make them wank over her.

 

Hey, FFXII was super fun after they added the job system.

 

I hope they do an HD remake so I can actually try that. Too lazy to emulate

 

I chose games I remembered that were Japanese and had women like that. I'd also argue a couple you've shown are still big titted and wearing sexualised clothing.

It's because it's an obvious trend we've all noticed. It's not like it's a conspiracy theory about Area 51, for years people have called out the over sexualisation of female character in JP games and thy keep churning them out.

You've given three games I think I gave eight or so. You have a point that the west does it too, I never denied that, but I claimed it was disproportionate these days, with the west generally moving past it on a wider scale.
Duke Nukem is an outdated concept, that's why the latest failed, because it had outdated design and themes. Mortal Kombat was released 22 years ago. It's outdated in todays world, and the latest does misrepresent women badly. Then again, it too had a terrible story that was stemming from its whole origins as a tournament fighting game.
Should I even note the obvious anime origins in Skullgirls? The game was inspired by old arcade beat em ups, especially King of Fights, Street Fighters, DoA, etc.
Most all of the characters I posted pics of came out in the last 5 or so years. I avoided posting pics of games older than that if I could, because that's what the JP market is still flooded by.

You bring up another really bad and bland character misrepresenting men as sexist sex hungry violent muscle men. I'm not a fan of them either.
I could link to several websites about the merits of good writing and when writing's bad, but no one seems to trust anything but their own opinion that what they like and is just fundamentally 'good' in writing. I love Kingdom Hearts, even the story in a away, but I know it's badly written and the characters are bad. I don't need to find the writing great to love something, it has other charms, but even I wouldn't ever merit it for being good when it's not, not even for bias reasons.

You're missing my argument. This isn't about appeal, this is about representation and reinforcement of stereotypes and how they are wrong. You can find rape games on the web, because that appeals to some, but that doesn't mean it should be allowed or supported. No one should get money out of exploitation.

Which is again sexualised. You think real armour or fantasy armour for a guy would show so much skin?

What's their child pornography industry like in Angola? Is it as common as the Japanese market? I doubt it, considering Angola's internet coverage and general media accessibility is behind the widespread nature of Japan. About 0.7% of their population had used the internet in 2010, which by now has probably risen to 2.5% as an estimate.

You missed my point when I was talking about child porn, not the age of consent, which I used as context. It's legal to own child porn there, that means twelve year olds and under. That's porn of people who have not even reached sexual maturity being treated as sexualised beings. Even if they've not experienced puberty, that's fine by Japanese societal laws. Please don't get me into the child sex industry and trafficking out there, because I think the point should be obvious here.

Read the article and my actual point. I didn't say it was the cause of all rape, I said it caused an increase in them according to some reports. And if they are everywhere, show me some examples of rape porn that's popular around the world and the criminal reports of rape in said region.

Proportions are higher in Japan than most every country, though. Why?
One argument is as you've explained like in one of the articles I linked, which I guess you didn't look at. Another argument is porn and video games fulfil desires of growing populations who prefer the safety and financial security of digital availability. Both are probably true, compounding on each oher. It's not like your point or mine counteract each other they could easily work together to support this.
What are the best possible examples of this sort of thing?

No i've judged them on their sex industry and video game development. I respect a lot of Japanese figures and a number of writers. I'm encompassing the media industry mainly. Stop making sweeping generalisations of me whilst telling me to stop making generalisations of a country.
I honestly don't get how disregarding my linked articles and points and saying 'everyone does it' excuses the generalised misrepresentation of women. You're avoiding or redirecting causes and reasons. You don't sound knowledgeable on the subject, and claim I don't either.

 

I kind of have the reverse opinion. If she were a good three dimensional character that could actually make me feel sympathy for her, I'd disapprove of her objectification a lot more than I do. As it is, she's not even enough of a character to even be considered a person. Even using feminine pronouns for her is a stretch because even the stereotypical "male fantasy" woman has some personality, and any real woman has ten times that. Unless you would complain about how mannequins at Victoria's Secret are over-sexualized, I don't see how you could say the same of Lightning.

That said, this is all my opinion and I didn't even want to get into this discussion anyway, but it's kind of taken over my thread so I'm gonna let myself be heard anyway.

God, I was just making a joke.[DOUBLEPOST=1395192283][/DOUBLEPOST]

Burn it to a disc?

 

Yes, you're right in a way. I was just trying to put across that character actually adds depth enough to someone's personality that'd i'd be able to ignore them physically. I usually get attracted to someone as I talk to them, no matter their appearance, and slowly they look better to me because their personality has appealed to me. That's my reasoning for being alright with good characters no matter their look. When a character comes off as bland and paper thin whilst attractive, i'd call them a mannequin. They're there to look good and nothing more.

I can ignore shoddy game design if the story is great, or ignore a bad plot if it's fun to play. But games that lack both feel like a struggle to me. Hopefully that explains things.

Have to get my kicks somewhere, and random discussions are usually a good place. Don't worry bout it.

 

Christ, posts in this got stupid and pointlessly lengthy...

 

Burning it to a disk is even more effort than just emulating it ._.

 

I can' t read your link since it' s a pdf (browsing on my PS3 here), but I take it they merely observed a correlation ? Even assuming their methodology was rock solid, correlation =/= causation. There are lots of pseudo studies blaming video games and movies for this or that going around these days. I haven' t seen any that was really conclusive so far.

 

I'm worried about what your opinion on women is if BIG TITTED = Sexualized

And yet you still continue to ignore every other country churning out over sexualised female characters

What makes you think it's not disproportionate in Japan?
Because a few games you cherry picked just happaned to fit your qutoa?
What about the tons that of popular Japanese games that DON'T?

You don't know what you're talking about
I'm not even being rude here, you actually don't know what you're talking about.
First of all

1. Duke Nukem did not fail, financially it met its requirement.
2. Duke Nukem DID however receive negative reviews due to the fact that it was a BAD GAME! Not because "huuur, it's concepts are outdated" but because it sacrificed a lot of what made Duke Nukem 3D good for watered down game mecahnics.
Duke Nukem 3D had vast environments, filled with secrets and all kinds of nooks and crannies that would take a few playthroughs for you to discover. It also allowed you to hold an onslaught of weapons as opposed to Forever which only let you carry 2 at a time.
BUT YOU WOULDN'T KNOW ANY OF THIS BECAUSE I DOUBT YOU'VE PLAYED EITHER DUKE NUKEM 3D OR DUKE NUKEM FOREVER
YOU ARE LITERALLY
MAKING THINGS UP!

SEE!?
YOU'RE DOING IT AGAIN
YOU ARE MAKING
THINGS
UP
Alex Ahad has said his artstyle is mostly a deriviation of the Scott Pilgrim style, hell he even had his artwork placed IN a Scott Pilgrim volume before
"B-BUT, SCOTT PILGRIM IS ANIME INSPIRED"
Do you see how silly this logic is? You can trace all KINDS of things back to anime, it doesn't make your point any more valid.

And the characters I posted are from recent years as well, what's your point?

Do you even know what the top selling game in Japan this month is?
This


Harvest ****ing moon
A game about taking care of a farm.

But I bet you don't even know what Harvest Moon is
And you know why? Because it's not sexualized therefore you don't hear people ranting on about it.
You people make such noise about everything bad but then when something GOOD happens you go "Oh that doesn't count".

It's called
HUMOR
Duke Nukem is not suppose to be mentally stimulating or a social commentary on the nature of man
It's the a letter to all those cheesy 80's action movies like Rambo and Predator.
It's mindless entertainment
Believe it or nor not everything all the time has to be intellectually stimulating, some people like to turn thier brains off every now and then and just enjoy things. That's what action movies do, that's what hyper violent movies do.
Don't like em? Well that's your thing. But they have thier place in society. We don't need everything trying to be some sort of Catcher in the Rye bastion of storytelling.

People play video games for different reasons.

Why the hell not?
If people wanna play a game about rape then let them play a game about rape.
People should be allowed to make video games about absolutely anything that they want.
Whaddya wanna do? Make a law that states "Games that involve rape should be banned"? Do you realize the ramifications of something like this?
Game about rape are already socially unacceptable. If you go to Japan and start talking about your experience with Rapeplay people aren't going to think you're a normal person. What more do you want?

Also FICTIONAL CHARACTERS cannot be exploited because they are NOT REAL.

Are you blind? The only skin being shown in that picture is some of her leg.

But it DIDN'T
In the past reporting rape wasn't socially viable. It was embarassing and something people generally avoided.
Nowadays that perception has for the most part changed, it exists in some doses but people actually REPORT rape crimes in this day and age.
It's not that people started raping eachother due to watching a video
It's that the people raping where actually being REPORTED to the authorities now.

It didn't cause anything.

And what the ****? You want me to get you an example of RAPE PORN?
Go on /hc/ or some other bastion on the internet. It's not hard to find. I'm not gonna link you to ****ing porn.

You have made the baseless assumption that men and women are somehow completely physically and emotionally fulfilled by porn and video games.
Those are HUGE ramifications you are making and I have to wonder what your opinion on human beings is if you think being fulfilled is something as simple as that.

1. Yes because judging a country based on their SEX INDUSTRY is perfectly viable.
2. You've said squat about their video game development. You've taken extreme examples without even taking into consideration the other extremes. Like I said, I doubt you even know what the top selling games in Japan are right now.

At the moment they are
Yakuza: Ishin
Harvest Moon 3D: A new Beginning
Fossil Fighters: Infinite Gear

Do these games get no mention? You didn't seem to comment on this kind of game development. You just solely hand picked the ones that were convenient to your argument.

And yet you've mentioned very little OF the media industry.
All you've talked about is porn, anime and video games.
Japanese media is not solely composed of those things in the same way French media is not solely composed of Cartoons and Tintin.
You haven't looked about books, or Television shows that aren't TV or even movies.
Hell you haven't even given a proper look at anime and video games.


I know women are sexualized in video games.
I'm not saying it's a good thing.

I am saying that it is an ignorant thing to say no matter how you look at it that "X country is the WORST offender of this ever" when you have actively ignored every other good thing they have ever done.

 

Anime was influenced by Disney
therefore the sexualization comes from Disney
Which is in Kingdom Hearts
Which has Final Fantasy
Which has Lightning
Who is sexualzied
FF is an anime
Anime was influenced by Disney

 

God created man
Man has sex to recreate
It's Gods fault we sexualize things

 

If God didn't make women they wouldn't be sexualized