317 réponses à ce sujet

[Allan Schumacher]

Roxy Ferret wrote...

Alan? Almost 33 is just at/after the inception of video gaming? I love your thinking, but I was video gaming WAY ahead of you. BBSing was my first love, with all of its text based gaming, dial-up quirks, and vast innovations that lead to what is now the current consensus of video gaming. We led the pack. I'll gladly trade your age, but not for my video gaming experience.

~ Roxy

Well, I'd consider "after" to be within the span of 10 years.  I'm a Nintendo era person, but I was thinking early computer games and the Atari (and competitors) as the widescale push for gaming.

The only reason why I'd put myself at "inception" is that it could be argued that gaming, and who it's marketed towards now, was heavily influenced by the pushes Nintendo made in the 80s (the Atari was marketed more as a system for families, while the Nintendo was pushed as a toy for boys) in the aftermath of the video game crash.

[MesTarrant]

Darth Brotarian wrote...

These races aren't supposed to be radically different, they're all meant to be humanoids with similar features and traits. Furthermore it sounds like your grievance is more aimed towards mass effect then dragon age. And even further I don't understand how you can claim the women of various races look to similar to the men of human varieties when the men of those races also look just as similar to humans as they women do.

That's true, my beef IS more with ME than DA.


I described some differences in my original post in regard to qunari and dwarves, where the male versions did look significantly different (to me) than their human counterparts. 


Yes I would like an ugly (not Hollywood ugly... downright UGLY) female dwarf in the party to balance things out. Like she ends up having a stellar personality so everyone loves her like they do Varrick.


Now that I think about it, I do agree with some people who've pointed out here that most of the male models in DA are all the same - muscular, hot, etc. I suppose the topic of this post could be changed to "Male/Females - do we need more variety." If that were the case then I still think yes, more variety for both would be awesome. And why not? 

[stormhit]

Given that it's no longer the 90s, whenever someone uses the term 'politically correct' in a non-ironic fashion I assume they're an adorably smug college freshman somewhere. Because that's the most generous interpretation possible.

[Nightdragon8]

MesTarrant wrote...

ruggly wrote...

I think some of it is due to costs. While it would be nice, I don't see it happening quite yet. It's easier/less expsensive just to re-use assets.

Hmm. That's true. Though I suppose they could use some of the budget to amp up the females as opposed to using it solely for males, know what I mean? 50/50.

honeslty I thought all the males looked the same in ME1... I think the only difference was the one bloodhair C-sec guy... Everyone else had the same models I thought. In ME2 everyone looked the same expect for the compaions. In ME3 expect for the named NPCs I think they all looked the same...  even the males so, its not like it didn't happen the males as well.

[Beerfish]

MesTarrant wrote...




Yes I would like an ugly (not Hollywood ugly... downright UGLY) female dwarf in the party to balance things out. Like she ends up having a stellar personality so everyone loves her like they do Varrick.

See my avatar?  Female dwarf.  Make her your player character.  As was stated by one of the 1st posters in this thread.  The body type issue is no different from man to woman, there are large sized females and if you complaint is about ME, take it to the ME forum perhaps?

[MesTarrant]

Beerfish wrote...

MesTarrant wrote...




Yes I would like an ugly (not Hollywood ugly... downright UGLY) female dwarf in the party to balance things out. Like she ends up having a stellar personality so everyone loves her like they do Varrick.

See my avatar?  Female dwarf.  Make her your player character.  As was stated by one of the 1st posters in this thread.  The body type issue is no different from man to woman, there are large sized females and if you complaint is about ME, take it to the ME forum perhaps?

HUH... Yeah complaint about ME, discussion about DA. 


I see your point about the playable character customizations. I am talking more about NPCs/companions.


Look it's fine if you guys are disagreeing... It's possible to disagree in a more polite way.

Modifié par MesTarrant, 22 février 2014 - 11:18 .

[The Hierophant]

Now that i think about there's Nan, and Star Baby's adopted mom who had a different body model. DA2 lacking variation is understandable but i hope the character artists were given a little more wiggle room for Inquisition.

[Rogue Roxy]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Roxy Ferret wrote...

Alan? Almost 33 is just at/after the inception of video gaming? I love your thinking, but I was video gaming WAY ahead of you. BBSing was my first love, with all of its text based gaming, dial-up quirks, and vast innovations that lead to what is now the current consensus of video gaming. We led the pack. I'll gladly trade your age, but not for my video gaming experience.

~ Roxy

Well, I'd consider "after" to be within the span of 10 years.  I'm a Nintendo era person, but I was thinking early computer games and the Atari (and competitors) as the widescale push for gaming.

The only reason why I'd put myself at "inception" is that it could be argued that gaming, and who it's marketed towards now, was heavily influenced by the pushes Nintendo made in the 80s (the Atari was marketed more as a system for families, while the Nintendo was pushed as a toy for boys) in the aftermath of the video game crash.

LOL. Understood. But I still need to validate my having to learn COBAL and BASIC in school, and my (then) fixation with Commodore vs IBM (clones, etc.) over the years.Amiga ruled until.... it didn't *grin*. Who knew that 'IBM clones' would take over?? For awhile...

~ Roxy

[Xilizhra]

Yes I would like an ugly (not Hollywood ugly... downright UGLY) female dwarf in the party to balance things out. Like she ends up having a stellar personality so everyone loves her like they do Varrick.

Wasn't Varric considered to be quite handsome?

I have no problem with your request, though.

[lady_v23]

I agree! male characters do share body types, but there is a significant higher amount of variety for them.

aaand DA does actually have an "ugly" female npc

Modifié par lady_v23, 22 février 2014 - 11:25 .

[Zerker]

Allan Schumacher wrote...
I can't really say what the average age is.  You can disagree with the ESA studies since people will disagree on whether the games are truly games, or what have you, but if you're just speaking from personal experience and intuition, it's best to not "assure" us of anything

Hi Allan,
I am indeed speaking from "personal experience and intuition", and I am still assuring you. We are not having an actual arguement that anyone besides the people who share this hobby care about, and rightfully so. That usually means intuition is the best you can get.

That being said, I'm sure you are actively participating in the social events of the gaming community for a long time as well. Sometimes, it just doesn't take research to determine the character of a sub-culture; thinking on the global picture, where gaming is still mostly perceived as a hobby of introvert youngsters and people with less desire or chance to get an active social life, it is not surprising to find it as a hobby associated with teenage men for now. As I said, on some occasions you simply know the big picture without a study being very necessary, and that is coming from a science geek.

Hailing from middle-east, I can say that most of the time you just wouldn't say out loud that you are a gamer while hunting for a comforting night, or when you are over a certain age. I can again safely say that while this doesn't seem to be a radical issue, or not an issue at all in the West; the gaming community do indeed share certain traits that are near impossible to deny, male domination and age being the most apparent of them.

If you don't want to talk about demographics though, I won't push the issue any further. But my opinion that Bioware, like many others, do take advantage of some base desires remains the same; and that's not criticism, it's a well-known necessity to survive in a male dominated market. Visually simulating the instincts you simply can't satisfy in modern society, violence, need to kill, power struggles with other males, and for some the sexual ones(again, considering the "general" social status of the community) is a very attractive reason for men to play video games, and that's actually very, very healthy.

Modifié par Maddok900, 22 février 2014 - 11:48 .

[Hanako Ikezawa]

lady_v23 wrote...

I agree! male characters do share body types, but there is a significant higher amount of variety for them.

aaand DA does actually have an "ugly" female npc

Not her fault she was a starving slave, so her face was sunken in.

[Xilizhra]

Maddok900 wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...
I can't really say what the average age is.  You can disagree with the ESA studies since people will disagree on whether the games are truly games, or what have you, but if you're just speaking from personal experience and intuition, it's best to not "assure" us of anything

Hi Allan,
I am indeed speaking from "personal experience and intuition", and I am still assuring you. We are not having an actual arguement that anyone besides the people who share this hobby care about, and rightfully so. That usually means intuition is the best you can get.

That being said, I'm sure you are actively participating in the social events of the gaming community for a long time as well. Sometimes, it just doesn't take research to determine the character of a sub-culture; thinking on the global picture, where gaming is still mostly perceived as a hobby of introvert youngsters and people with less desire or chance to get an active social life, it is not surprising to find it as a hobby associated with teenage men for now. As I said, on some occasions you simply know the big picture without a study being very necessary, and that is coming from a science geek.

Hailing from middle-east, I can say that most of the time you just wouldn't say out loud that you are a gamer while hunting for a comforting night, or when you are over a certain age; I can again safely say that while this doesn't seem to be a radical issue, or not an issue at all in the West; the gaming community do indeed share certain traits that are near impossible to deny, male domination and age being the most apparent of them.

If you don't want to talk about demographics though, I won't push the issue any further. But my opinion that Bioware, like many others, do take advantage of some base desires remains the same; and that's not criticism, it's a necessity to survive in a male dominated market. Visually simulating the instincts you simply can't satisfy in modern society, violence, need to kill, power struggles with other males, and for some the sexual ones(again, considering the "general" social status of the community) is a very attractive reason for men to play video games, and that's actually very, very healthy.

All well and good, but it's just good sense to stimulate the sorts of things that interest more women as well as men, to make your customer base grow.

[Zerker]

Xilizhra wrote...
All well and good, but it's just good sense to stimulate the sorts of things that interest more women as well as men, to make your customer base grow.

That, I can agree with.

[wiccame]

Maddok900 wrote...

How about we just stop struggling to be politically correct, accept that human male will naturally search for something to fantasize about boning especially during the precious few hours of his day set apart solely for entertainment, and as a gaming company the audience of which is largely made up from relatively young male gamers, Bioware has to take advantage of that.

May be we can manage to ignore these trivialities and just focus on the quality of the actual story content, may be.

Just wondering if you are male or female, and if male and the tables turned would you find these things just trivialities?

[Xilizhra]

Maddok900 wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...
All well and good, but it's just good sense to stimulate the sorts of things that interest more women as well as men, to make your customer base grow.

That, I can agree with.

Which will, keep in mind, include women who have characters and body types that include classifications beyond "sexy."

[lady_v23]

LDS Darth Revan wrote...

lady_v23 wrote...

I agree! male characters do share body types, but there is a significant higher amount of variety for them.

aaand DA does actually have an "ugly" female npc

Not her fault she was a starving slave, so her face was sunken in.

fair enough!

[Zerker]

Xilizhra wrote...
Which will, keep in mind, include women who have characters and body types that include classifications beyond "sexy."

I'm not sure that's a general demand or an element important enough to spend resources for, to keep the female community happier. But again, I'm a guy; which usually means I'm as good as an inanimate object on that. Do you really think that would indeed stimulate an instict that is not well-met, or a desire or two in female mind?

Modifié par Maddok900, 22 février 2014 - 11:56 .

[Xilizhra]

Maddok900 wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...
Which will, keep in mind, include women who have characters and body types that include classifications beyond "sexy."

I'm not sure that's a general demand or an element worthy enough to spend resources for to keep the female sub-conscious happy. But again, I'm a guy; which usually means I'm as good as an inanimate object  on that. Do you really think that would indeed stimulate an instict that is not well-met, or a desire or two in female mind?

It makes the setting seem more genuine and less like an artificial construct for straight men to get their virtual sex on in between bloodbaths.

[Zerker]

Xilizhra wrote...
It makes the setting seem more genuine and less like an artificial construct for straight men to get their virtual sex on in between bloodbaths.

Point taken.

[ames4u]

Variety is the spice of life!

However, I can understand why Bioware refuses to give full control over the body shape of the main character. Because everyone would make a female protag with jugs bigger than a warrior's broadsword. So in this, I agree with not getting that level of control. But I would prefer more sensible body shapes-the shape of women in the previous two games were ridiculous.

Edit: Whoops, I mistook the op's info-drop as a rant about character customisation. My bad!

Modifié par ames4u, 23 février 2014 - 12:02 .

[Reznore57]

They are trying to add more variety.
But I really don't think Bioware is the place to go to if you want to get challenged by (female) beauty.
They mostly create characters to be eye candy.And if they are really fugly , the characters are probably meanie or here for comedy value.

I was reading the thought process behind Cassandra design , and they are trying to have stronger visuals.Which is good.
But imho they just won't go outside the box.
The artist talked about Disney ,Cassandra is agressive so she has a strong jaw just like in Disney dwarves are round = they are nice little fella , the witch is ugly = she's a meanie.
I think it's a valid design choice , but for me it's quite boring.
Those visual "stereotypes " have been around for ages.
In DOTS , one devs was saying Cassandra fight for the good side , so she have to be very beautiful or something like that.

Anyway I would say that most characters are designed to be pleasing , male and female alike.
Male characters can get away with not being models more easily if they are charismatic.
Ugliness or not fitting beauty standard is often seen as a deeper flaw in women than man.
And people tends to be incredibly nitpicky about female features.

[dragonflight288]

I like the way Capcom handled body types in Dragon's Dogma. They had a huge variety of options for both men and women, it showed in the NPCs as well, and after the graphics update with the expansion it felt like a breathing, living world....more or less as it is still a game.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Fortunately old farts like myself (almost 33)

Old?  33?

Get off my lawn.

[Mirrman70]

I just want one of you pro-female-non-sexiness people to admit that they make most of the male characters ideally attractive. I don't see very many ugly men either...
also I'm going to bring up that Aveline wasn't really "sexy"