Excuse-O-Rama

[LazyAza]

Damn fucking straight. I'm an artist who draws whatever the fuck I want to also. If I just wanna draw a lady with some big tits I'll draw a lady with big tits. If I wanna draw a genuinely cool character male or female, then I'll draw that and big tits aren't something I'd consider because that's stupid. Its very very rare that pandering sexual imagery can be justified with context or whatever.

I am sick of artists and people in general trying to defend and justify what they create with bullshit nonsense excuses, when its clearly done for titilation and gratuitous pandering and nothing else. If that's what ya wanna do then do it, don't feel shame about it. Just don't try to pretend that's not why you did it. This is why I have more respect for the Senran Kagura guy for example than many other creators, dood literally just proudly says aloud how much he loves giant heaving anime boobs and that's why most of his characters have them and why those anime/games are what they are. And that makes that guy awesome.

Meanwhile Kojima has the most non-sensicel excuse ever for Quiets design and in the very same game has lingering zoomed in boob shots and the character literally shoving her ass in your face IN THE GOD DAMN GAME MENU.

Like fuck. Anyone who tries to defend that shit is a damn moron. Kojima wanted to perv on Quiet and in doing so he actively detracted from her otherwise cool character, end of story.

 

[CrimsonBlaze]

I know it's tempting to comment on the large mammaries, but the first thing that caught my eye was how adorable Quiet is portrayed in this comic strip that she's downright huggable.

The Sorceress still looks weird, with her proportions being out of whack.

And Cortana...well, I haven't really followed the Halo series closely to really make out any clear distinctions, but I guess it's expected that she might be more sexual as the years go by.

 

[Amir Kondori]

I love me some fan service. I think everyone, straight, gay, male, female, or whatever should get at least a little fan service in their games.

I don't care how Quiet breathes but she sure looks cute and badass all at the same time. I find it appealing. I find the exaggerated art of Dragon's Crown appealing, not even really because of the big boobs and butts but just the overall 2d crazily exaggerated atheistic of it all.

I wish more developers and artists would just be upfront about saying, "We find this look to be sexy and appealing". It isn't an evil thing to be sexy, even though a lot of American culture seems to say otherwise.

 

[Callate]

Maybe if we weren't living in a world where virtually any public response to something offered for consumption had to be treated like the recipient was shoring up defenses for a siege, there would be fewer excuses?

Lame excuses aren't surprising. What's surprising is that we still get any responses at all that aren't scripted and bullet-pointed. If I were in PR and hosting a seminar for potential industry interviewees, I suspect the first thing out of my lips would be, "I know some of you are thinking that your audience will find your candor refreshing, your relatability surprising, and put aside any prejudices or misconceptions once you clearly spell out your point of view. You are @#$%ing adorable. Now go put duct tape over your mouth until that naiveté passes."

 

[balladbird]

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Further, it may be stereotypical, but as far as I know there are actual black African tribespeople that still use primitive weapons like bows and stuff in real life, so... not actually racist? Especially given that it shows modern-society black people too, so it's not even saying "All black people in Africa are savage tribesman". Didn't stop the claims of horrid racism.
.

Nah, the game actually, canonically, states that the virus/parasite/whatever caused the people to long to "dress in the garb of their ancestors". Yes, I'm not making that up, it's stated in some of the journals you find scattered about.

The point where your zombie infection causes people to feel the overwhelming desire to don grass skirts and chuck spears at the protagonists is definitely the point of racism, to me. Though it wouldn't have caused me to roll my eyes quite so much if we saw a few kilts and celtic robes on the zombies in raccoon city.

 

[Gretha Unterberg]

But yeah, I agree with the comic. Everyone can see that you're going for the horny boy demographic, to pretend otherwise just makes it look silly. Unless I'm supposed to believe that so many female characters just feel so darn empowered by gettin' dey titties out in a battlefield.
Like, it's fine. Just own up to it.

Dunno, I'm no professional writer but when it comes to character design
don't you usually start with the endresult and then come up backstory/reasons/and stuff that lead to the presence?

Calling it a day after the initial concept instead of fleshing them out ,
sounds more like bad/lazy writing rather then "Just own up to it" , imho.

 

[Naturally Sound]

I have always liked Kamitani for his imaginative honesty and expressiveness. As over-the-top his designs can be, I feel at ease when you know the artist doesn't give a damn. He also reminds me of the not-completely-subtle sexual repression among Japanese directors/artists/developers/consumers/etc.

While Quiet's outfit did not bug me, it was when Kojima used "Metal Gear science" to explain it is what did and I did not buy it. It was the first cutscene that literally made me yell "BULLSHIT, KOJIMA!". I've felt smarter for some reason, then regretful. There is also the Sniper Skulls cutscene that makes you wonder if you're playing a Platinum Games game. What is with those unnecessary close-ups on butts and boobs?

 

[BX3]

Soooo, I see where Grey's coming from. See see where many people that share this are coming from. I have a friend who's an artist and draws porn, and even he complains about it. I get it. However, it's never really bugged me, and... I find that it bugs me even less now that I'm older and in some cases actually encourage it, and the reasoning for it is very unpopular... but here goes. It's because of the pedantry that surrounds these types of characters.

Sexualized characters are just gonna happen. Characters are gonna appeal to baser demographics. Not to say there's no good reason to push for more and better things from our designers/developers, but this type of design choice ain't going away. When I see the rigmarole that surrounds the more titalizing of characters, I honestly find it funny, and when bullshit justifications of formed from it... I find it even funnier. The common anime trope of "it's easier to move around in" bugs me, not because it's used, but because of how often it's used. "This justification is insulting to our intelligence". "Heh... good" is usually my very first though.

This (among the more obvious reasons) is essentially why I will sing Senran Kagura's praises all day long. The creator has gone on record and says that he like boobs and butts. His design philosophy is based around boobs and butts. His fellow co-workers are super into the boobs and butts. His fans love the boobs and butts. HOWEVER, there is, in fact, a silly justification that's used for why the characters' clothes fly off: ninja magic. The ninja transformation outfits are projections, and the weaker the ninja becomes, the weaker the projections. They've gone on record for liking tits, but added in-universe justifications anyway. Why? Because, that's why. And I adore that.


I will freely admit, that this is an antagonistic - and probably even unhealthy - position to take... but over the years, I've just gotten so exhausted that when shit gets set on fire, I can't help but find a weird glee in it.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

Interesting.
So writer should just give up on giving any in-universe explanation for anything they write because it doesn't actually exist. It's the writer that wrote it.
Link is the hero because he was chosen by the Goddess Hylia? Nuhuh, it's because Miyamoto wanted it to be so.
Zelda has magical powers because she has literally the blood of a goddess? Nuhuh, it's because Miyamoto wanted it to be so.
The Dahaka is after the Princ in Prince of Persian Warrios Within because he broke the timeline and is ruining everything? Nope, it's because Ubisoft wanted it so.

Do you actually understand what you're saying? Yes, the designer made the design, but how the fuck does the in-universe explanation not count? So stories don't need to be consistent and plot holes are completely okay because that's how the writer chose it to be. Nothing in those games is real. So why are some in-universe explanations okay, but others arbitrarily aren't? Because you don't like them?

Some explanations are obviously bullshit, but that doesn't mean all explanations are worthless.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

There's something I'd like to add to this - I never ask "why". I feel it's just a weak word and it prefaces weak questions when it's used in such a manner. Mainly because, when you ask "why" you can answer it however you want to...and it answers the question. It may not give you the answer you want, but that's what you get for asking such a weak question. I ask "how" and/or "what". I ask those because they tend to give you a clearer and, usually, better answer. It might take longer to get to that answer, but you probably won't have around 5 bajillion questions after you ask your first question. And at the risk of sounding like a complete asshole, I feel that people who ask "why" are not truly interested in the answer and/or not capable of critical thought.

I apologize if that was a little rant-y.

Why?
;p

But seriously. This seems like some tortured logic. The question isn't the issue with this problem of getting an answer/wanted information.
The problem is the intent of the person being asked wanting to bullcrap their way out of giving you an honest answer.

For example, say instead of asking "Why is this character designed like this?" I asked "What was the reasoning you had behind this characters design?"

Or heck, what if I said "Tell me the reason or reasons why you made this character like this". That isn't even a question at that point, but they all are trying to do the same thing. The differences between them are just schematics that don't really add up to much.

The problem is that regardless of the question (or command, or whatever) the person being asked can still talk bullcrap around answering the question.
I see sort of where you're coming from. Some questions are asked for ulterior motives that don't involve the answer and being specific can indeed help you find better information.
But at least 8 or 9 times out of ten, the reason anyone asks a question is pretty straight forward.

"If I didn't what to know, Why would I ask?" ;D

Spoiler: ...

The ulterior motive for the last question was to give ya a giggle. ;3

Have a good one!

While that last bold is two questions in one (and I think 'what' is meant to be 'want', idk but I'm guessing such) I did get a nice chuckle out of it. After re-thinking the issue, I'd like to clarify and say - it's more that 'why' is such an open ended question that, more often than not, the end result is just mindless bickering. Of course, as you said, if such is the user's intent, then using 'why' in this method would achieve their ends better than any other question. That is the main reason that I choose to ignore most people that use the 'why' question, because any answer could suffice to answering 'why'.

Spoiler: Why?

Alien zombie cheese danish, that's why!

 

[Phasmal]

Dunno, I'm no professional writer but when it comes to character design
don't you usually start with the endresult and then come up backstory/reasons/and stuff that lead to the presence?

Calling it a day after the initial concept instead of fleshing them out ,
sounds more like bad/lazy writing rather then "Just own up to it" , imho.

Yes, they do, but when so many battle-hardened ladies just happen to have their jigglypuffs out, I start raising my eyebrows at the fact that they all `just find it so empowering/distracting for their enemies/breathe through their skin`. Like, we know that's not why it is. So.... why even bother? A character's state of tit-window or no tit-window is not usually of massive story significance.
So- yeah. Don't treat audiences like idiots. We all know why it's there.

 

[Gretha Unterberg]

Dunno, I'm no professional writer but when it comes to character design
don't you usually start with the endresult and then come up backstory/reasons/and stuff that lead to the presence?

Calling it a day after the initial concept instead of fleshing them out ,
sounds more like bad/lazy writing rather then "Just own up to it" , imho.

Yes, they do, but when so many battle-hardened ladies just happen to have their jigglypuffs out, I start raising my eyebrows at the fact that they all `just find it so empowering/distracting for their enemies/breathe through their skin`. Like, we know that's not why it is. So.... why even bother? A character's state of tit-window or no tit-window is not usually of massive story significance.
So- yeah. Don't treat audiences like idiots. We all know why it's there.

Because bothering might make things better?
Yes, I'm aware that tastes differ when it comes to what it better in writing.

You can add a shirtless Shatner because you wanted a shirtless Shatner and everyone knows that this is why.
But if you add a reason why the captain takes of his uniform in this episode you treat audiences like idiots,
while having him randomly running around like this ,just for the sake of fanservice is better?
Afraights thats where our tastes differ.

not bothering is the first step to a michael bay movie. (^_^)

 

[shintakie10]

I know it's tempting to comment on the large mammaries, but the first thing that caught my eye was how adorable Quiet is portrayed in this comic strip that she's downright huggable.

The Sorceress still looks weird, with her proportions being out of whack.

And Cortana...well, I haven't really followed the Halo series closely to really make out any clear distinctions, but I guess it's expected that she might be more sexual as the years go by.

God I hated Cortana in the newest one.

Like look at those side by side comparisons from each game on. In Halo 1 (partially due to the graphic capabilities at the time) she looks like just a rectangular block. Really not appealing. Halo 2-3 she starts lookin like an actual graphical representation of a human women. That's cool. She still looks very much like an AI, but one that's emulating a human form (like Odo from DS9). Then she's full on sex object. What the fuck is that noise?

In all the other games I never thought of her as naked. She was an AI that displayed a holographic representation of a women. Heck, it took until Halo 3 before she even had somethin resemblin breasts, which still fine with because it still fit the character portrayed and wasn't incredibly weird lookin. Now, even without the stupid ass interview about it, she looks like she's naked. I never thought that before and now that's all I see. Whelp, Cortana is totally nude now. Its stupid and pointless outside of some developers wanting to look at titties as they worked.

Gross is what it is.

I don't mind fan service. Really I enjoy fan service. High School DXD is amazingly fun to watch for example. Monster Musume is a joy. However they don't pretend their fanservice is anythin other than that (with the exception of stuff like Desert Punk that's pointin out how ridiculous it can get by overloadin you on purpose, which I adored). Tryin to logic bullshit me into believin you're not just puttin a women with F cup breasts in a teeny tiny bikini to stare at her tits insults my intelligence.

 

[Areloch]

.

Further, it may be stereotypical, but as far as I know there are actual black African tribespeople that still use primitive weapons like bows and stuff in real life, so... not actually racist? Especially given that it shows modern-society black people too, so it's not even saying "All black people in Africa are savage tribesman". Didn't stop the claims of horrid racism.
.

Nah, the game actually, canonically, states that the virus/parasite/whatever caused the people to long to "dress in the garb of their ancestors". Yes, I'm not making that up, it's stated in some of the journals you find scattered about.

The point where your zombie infection causes people to feel the overwhelming desire to don grass skirts and chuck spears at the protagonists is definitely the point of racism, to me. Though it wouldn't have caused me to roll my eyes quite so much if we saw a few kilts and celtic robes on the zombies in raccoon city.

1) Huh, didn't know that. I played the game with my friends, so we didn't really pay attention to the journals or the like. By 5 the story was total trash anyways, but that is a pretty lame explanation. Heck, it doesn't even explain why they had fully set up hut villages, so it's not even really an explanation at all.

2) Man, can we please have another attempt at a Raccoon City game with one of the characters rocking a kilt? Maybe using a claymore for their melee. That sounds awesome. (Also, to be fair on this point, the parasite in 5 was based on the Las Plagas from 4, not the T-Virus from the earlier games)

But yeah, that sounds like a case of trying to over-explain the entire thing and making it kinda dumber in the end (like my opinion about them trying to explain The Cobras or Psycho Mantis in MGS5)

 

[Phasmal]

Because bothering might make things better?
Yes, I'm aware that tastes differ when it comes to what it better in writing.

You can add a shirtless Shatner because you wanted a shirtless Shatner and everyone knows that this is why.
But if you add a reason why the captain takes of his uniform in this episode you treat audiences like idiots,
while having him randomly running around like this ,just for the sake of fanservice is better?
Afraights thats where our tastes differ.

not bothering is the first step to a michael bay movie. (^_^)

I'm just gonna agree to disagree on that. I think if you're gonna do fanservice, whether or not you slap a weak excuse on it doesn't really affect anything. Better in my opinion to just be honest, or just not bother to include cheap fanservice at all.

 

[sumanoskae]

Were I designing the game I'd say the exact same thing; you don't have to apologize for what you like. I find the idea that titillating design is somehow inherently degrading of it's subject to be troubling; it smacks of puritanism.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

Because bothering might make things better?
Yes, I'm aware that tastes differ when it comes to what it better in writing.

You can add a shirtless Shatner because you wanted a shirtless Shatner and everyone knows that this is why.
But if you add a reason why the captain takes of his uniform in this episode you treat audiences like idiots,
while having him randomly running around like this ,just for the sake of fanservice is better?
Afraights thats where our tastes differ.

not bothering is the first step to a michael bay movie. (^_^)

I think if you're gonna do fanservice, whether or not you slap a weak excuse on it doesn't really affect anything. Better in my opinion to just be honest, or just not bother to include cheap fanservice at all.

That is a sentiment I agree with. Though, when you think about it, a great marketing strategy is to get people to remember your product, and the old axiom "When I do good, no one remembers; when I do bad, no one forgets" comes in full swing when these types of issues come around. Same for other media, as well - hell, Fox News is America's prime example of that.

 

[Imp_Emissary]

While that last bold is two questions in one (and I think 'what' is meant to be 'want', idk but I'm guessing such) I did get a nice chuckle out of it. After re-thinking the issue, I'd like to clarify and say - it's more that 'why' is such an open ended question that, more often than not, the end result is just mindless bickering. Of course, as you said, if such is the user's intent, then using 'why' in this method would achieve their ends better than any other question. That is the main reason that I choose to ignore most people that use the 'why' question, because any answer could suffice to answering 'why'.

Spoiler: Why?

Alien zombie cheese danish, that's why!

Bah! xD That sneaky what. Always wanted to be want. An identity crisis I think, poor thing.

Back to the topic, again that's ignoring the real problem. You can't really blame the question, or the person asking it if the intent of the person being asked is to give a crap answer. Let alone say they're incapable of critical thought.

One could respond "Space undead dairy nation, that's why!" to any of the examples I gave.
If anything, maybe you should be more worried when people put WHY in their answer. Why isn't really that open ended of a question, unless the person answering is intent on not being honest.

Why's purpose is to be used to ask for reasons, or purpose. You say that any answer could be used for why, but if you're intent in asking the question is to find the reason or purpose, than any question/sentence telling someone to tell you something[sub][sub](There a specific word for that? Closest I can think of is command.)[/sub][/sub] could be responded to with a nonsense or dishonest answer because a person has to be willing to be honest with you.
The problem isn't what question is used, but rather the intent of people being asked the questions to be dishonest (which they could do with any question/command to speak).

How can the person asking the question be at fault, if the person responding could lie to anything?
Again, I agree that you can craft better questions (make them somewhat more specific), but the results will ultimately be up to the person being asked. Unless you know of a question that forces people to be honest. [sub][sub][sub]If you do, please do share.[/sub][/sub][/sub]

 

[kurokotetsu]

But the question itself is stupid. It's like asking why Michelangelo or Da Vinci painted and sculpted nude women as their work, or why most famous actors and actresses being cast for movies are almost all fit and attractive, other than if the role requires them not to be.

It's a stupid question, it's obvious that it is because they appreciate the form, if you want an answer to the question then go study aesthetics, sexual attraction, the vitruvian figure and golden ratio.

Fascinating. Please tell me more. Which of Leonardo's of Michalangelo works are you thinking off? The Pieta? The Virgin in the Rocks? The Giocconda? O maybe The David? Or Adam and God in the Sixtine Chappel? Or The Last Supper? Or the Viturbian man? Oh pray tell me about all the naked female forms of Buonarroti and Da Vinci. I wish to learn about those aesthetics of the nude female form in classical Italian Renaissance under the strict suppervision of the Catholic Church.

Of course artist go by aesthetics. But those aesthetics are usually ruled by the era and other factors. But bullshit reasons are bullshit reason and not go past us. That is what this comic is criticizing.

OT: I can get about a real excuse. An empowerement one. I do now women that like to dress sexy because it is their decission and they like feeingwanted. SOme other don´t care about that. Perfectly fine. But tell me a character breathes through her skin or that an AI is sexy to distract enemies I will say "No, you are lying". Tell us it is fan service. It might not be the best reason to make an aesthetic design but you aren{t using clearly lies to justify the reason (seeing another character in MGS was covered and still breathing through their skin makes anyone call BS). Reality is better. Just stick with it.

 

[Piecewise]

There's nothing wrong with sexualizing characters.