Honestly, I make my characters with far bigger boobs than I have in real life, I make a character with actual buttcheeks and not something so flat you could play a movie on via projector, I make their face NOT look like mine because...well lets just say I don't for reasons. I want my character to look smoking hot because I know I'm only average looking in real life. people play these games to have characters NOT look like themselves and the character create should reflect that. If you want a hot chick and a muscle dude, then by all means that should be allowed, if you want an average looking character, then that should be allowed, if you want an ugly looking character, that should be allowed. Saying one side can't have that because it offends the other side is use stupid in my opinion. Let people play the characters they want and leave them be.
I would like to see a range of "attractive" to "unattractive" physical features. What some people consider attractive is up to them. i.e. Some people could find a larger body type more attractive than a thinner body type, or hair colors, heights, face shapes etc. I think any "sexualized" features would be off of the table with the cartoony graphics, with the exception of possibly erotic body parts... which I'm not in favor of personally; But even with cartoonish graphics, I'd like characters to be proportional.
For a while, most characters were made to be fairly sexy. More recently, games have desexualized character models. I support the consensus here, which is that the full range should be possible. And as much as I enjoyed bikini plate, it is really too ridiculous. Revealing caster robes, however, seem to make sense...
OCastitatisLilium said:OCastitatisLilium pretty well sums up my position on this as well. I play a Wizard as a main and don’t want him buff, or hot. I want him thin, and old. I would sure like a long beard for him, RPG’s never seem to allow long enough beards! Now for the meat shield I hide behind, I want him HOT, I want bulging shoulders and ripped abs. Same story with the females, speaking for my wife she is going to want exactly what OCastitatisLilium described. As for the bikini armor, and those that claim immersion breaking. Seriously, just how much time did you spend stressing over the fact that the Female Warrior was wearing a bikini? Enough to deny her that option if she wanted it? I don’t think it should be the norm, or even a common theme for women’s armor, but it shouldn’t be completely excluded either.Honestly, I make my characters with far bigger boobs than I have in real life, I make a character with actual buttcheeks and not something so flat you could play a movie on via projector, I make their face NOT look like mine because...well lets just say I don't for reasons. I want my character to look smoking hot because I know I'm only average looking in real life. people play these games to have characters NOT look like themselves and the character create should reflect that. If you want a hot chick and a muscle dude, then by all means that should be allowed, if you want an average looking character, then that should be allowed, if you want an ugly looking character, that should be allowed. Saying one side can't have that because it offends the other side is use stupid in my opinion. Let people play the characters they want and leave them be.
dorotea said: My own opinions:
1. We should have a decent range of choices for our own characters but nothing blatantly pandering. We do not need topless as in Age of Conan. That went better with their lore than with ours. Limited choice if necessary for development purposes is fine with me. To me hairdo is more important than face since while adventuring that is about all we see (the view in a MMO is normally from the back and clothes or armor covers much or all of the body below the neck) but others feel differently.
2. Character clothes and armor should also give choices of appearance. I consider a plate wearer in armor that looks like a metal string bikini ridiculous but if someone wants to wear it fine. Maybe the game will give me a haha emote to use whenever I see them.
3. NPCs should look more or less normal not blatant unless the lore or situation calls for something different. If an area has high temperatures I would expect either very skimpy clothes or concealing robes or the like. If my adventures take me to a beach I would expect beach attire. I would not expect semi-nude women in a downtown area of a moderate or cold temperature place unless I was adventuring in a whorehouse.
Since my casual, almost throw-away use of the term "hot" is what I'm sure sparked this thread, and people were trying to give me s*** for it... I was not expecting much from this thread.
But I am pleasantly surprised! A lot of people are giving realistic, level headed responses. In modern culture, people tend to play it safe and just give a opinion that sounds like something that would be approved as PC by far-left ideology.
The best answer truly is "options to play what I want". Want to play as Shrek? Awesome, if that's what you enjoy? Want to play as a chad or super model? Same.
When starring at a character creator... it can be hard to know what you want at times. This is one reason I have always chosen based on "cool" or "hot". It's just a quick, simple feeling I don't have to think about and can then move on. One I know I wont regret later. In EQ, my mains were a high elf male, and a black vah shir. I chose them because I thought they were cool, and I wouldn't regret them. Which I never did. In wow on the other side of things for example? I chose a tauren for one of my characters... simply because my options were limited... and did end up regretting it for years! Only recently did I finally change it, since there are now more options.
Speaking of wow, its a game where such a choice comes up more often simply due to transmog options. In that game, I have started making more female characters when I used to make largely only male. Why? Because there is just more variety of choice when finding what you think looks good on a female character. IMHO, male characters in that game, no matter what the gear... look kind of samey. But thats more on the armor style.
Then there is the old common response you hear from people. It may sound crude, or sexist... But its true, and just how things are in reality. The "If I am going to stare at a character for hours on end, I'd rather find it appealing". I softened that up a little, but the gist is common.
Not everyone will agree with every way I or others would make choices, and thats fine. You do you. Just don't try to make my choices for me or limit my options.
Oh. And since the question of this thread includes NPC's too... Yea. Hot and cool looking characters would be great. So would ugly ones, and average ones. Variety in a game is nice. And with variety, you can achieve NPC's that stand out more.
In general... I would just like to see more companies not cave to far-left ideals. Such things dictating design really does try to make decisions for the whole based on the views of the few. It's silly because the excuse is "to be more inclusive", when in reality they are being less inclusive. Let people make their own choices.
justdrop said: Can we not make this political grandstanding?
Ok. So maybe this forum is still toxic...
If you think me saying what amounts to "lets take politics out of this stuff" or "don't impose the political beliefs of some on others" is "grandstanding"... you need to serious help. The only grandstanding I saw was others doing that to me in the other thread, as they tried to show off their perceived moral superiority over me.
Since this topic was made based on poor inference of something I said, and there is level-headed responses here, I figured it would be a good chance better clarify my position. Any mention of politics I made is just for context. That is all.