Now this is some nice armour! Particularly loving the mix of modern methods such as anodization with classic designs like the flower themed besagews.
- wincenworks
@bikiniarmorbattledamage / bikiniarmorbattledamage.tumblr.com
Now this is some nice armour! Particularly loving the mix of modern methods such as anodization with classic designs like the flower themed besagews.
- wincenworks
Dragonheir: Silent Gods was released in 2023 and partnered with Dungeons & Dragons, getting to include Drizzt Do'urden and even Elminster the Sage in their game. They even managed to hire YouTube sensation Deerstalker Pictures to do a promotion about it.
And um... yeah... on their site they open with Drizzt but some of these other "heroes" look like they are trying to emulate some older marketing strategies that we've critiqued in depth in the past.
-wincenworks
I'm not sure what I expected from the people behind Wartune, but I'm sad they no longer think we're deserving of an orgy today. ):
(Ads for Demon Slayer 3: New Era, 7Road)
Originally published at: https://eschergirls.com/photo/2023/05/11/demons-can-only-hurt-your-arm-apparently
I just feel the need to point out... that there is a self-professed "ridiculous parody" (intended for pornography) is somehow... better (or at least at parity) with a product that is supposed to be intended for regular audiences. (linked tumblr is very nsfw)
I'm starting to think this marketing isn't really about the games...
-wincenworks
Sexual themes
If this doesn't happen in Marvel Animation's X-Men '97 then my childhood will have officially been ruined.
-wincenworks
Girls just want one thing and it's properly armoured arms.
So I just want to say, if you're into cute girls in armor and you're not following @vanishlily then you're missing out.
As well as great art inspired by They do do sexy silliness from time to time, and when they do - it's fun. Just ask Skallagrim.
Plus they also come up with much, much more honest and innovative solutions to wanting to blend sexy and practical than we're used to seeing in conventional media:
-wincenworks
Soft-shaded commission, a mermaid lass for Syrenka
Want to have fairly heavy metal armor, but neer run the risk of drowning because it's too heavy?
There is a character type that can handle that.
-wincenworks
So, I'm not going to name him because I don't particularly want his fans finding it via searches and sending me weird nonsense to my inbox, and honestly I don't want people who don't know him receiving psychic damage due to exposure to his opinions - but a certain streaming personality whose primary contribution is toxicity is getting angry that various mega-corporations that happen to originate in East Asia are continuing to focus on marketing broadly to get the most sales, rather than just pandering to miserable straight white men who are scared of anyone different to them.
Basically the same people who used to scream "Sex sells! Deal with it! Facts don't care about your feelings!" are now having breakdowns when it turns out massive mega-corporations don't want to be their friend/nanny/punching-bag, they want to make as much money as possible and the obvious way to achieve that is to broaden their audience, to make more people interested in buying their game.
Because the $100 from a personal with a marginalized identity who joins the series midway, spends exactly as well as the $100 for the cishet white guy who then goes on to start a harassment campaign against a developer via his social media clout, and uses the proceeds to buy Hot Pockets and bootleg NSFW merchandise (I assume).
Granblue Fantasy is a game series which has... largely resisted this trend. It's been releasing games, etc for ten years so, so many depictions of the player characters could be used as an illustration of our double standards tag.
(Also the male protagonist, Gran, is the one the series is named for when translated into English... there is no Djeetablue Fantasy - despite the many attempts by the fanbase to use memes to manifest it. However her name is incorporated into the native Japanese title... nobody tell him in case he decides that's "woke".)
So this guy who screams about studios who go woke, and was 100% going to play the latest entry in it... he'd support it right?
Nah, he complained he didn't like the story, he didn't get it and posted videos of him doing his signature "this is so bad" face. Man who lives off Hot Pockets and has unreasonable expectations of everyone else, failed to have his expectations met.
It's probably good he bailed out there before he found out that Granblue Fantasy, and a lot of game series like it - often have a lot of female fans who are in it for the story, the characters, the cute boys and the generally fun of the world.... all the stuff he hates.
If you doubt this, there's a foolproof way to check....
Oh wow I wonder why more and more studios are deciding it's a bad idea to court the attention of guys like him.
-wincenworks
Ordinarily I'd save this for a Friday treat, but the clock is ticking down on this Kickstarter that seems... very relevant to many of our readers interests.
It's already passed it's goal by a wide margin and has less than 30 hours to go - so if you think you'd be interested in one of these Tarot Deck of Male Empowerment - check it out quick.
You can also find more images of this card art by Mazjojo on his Instagram,
-wincenworks
So Player Unknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG), the game which inspired the Battle Royale mode that came to define Fortnite, is doing a Chinese New Year promo themed around Journey to the West. Specifically it's themed around the trio of divine guardians who served as the primary protectors.
So briefly, I would like to discuss depictions of Zhu Bajie in popular media... who I generally refer to as Pigsy since, like many westerners - my first exposure to the character was the Japanese TV series Monkey (1978 - 1980) - in my case dubbed into English.
That's him on the right, with the muck rake. I also use this name because it's pretty much an accurate translation of the character's core premise after he is cast down into the mortal realm. It's how he's very consistently depicted:
Honor of Kings (2015)
Monkie Kid (2020 - )
It's pretty much consistent to the point where the issue with googling for examples is finding the specific product they're linked to since he always looks like a pig man.... just like the PUBG unlockables above depict him as.
So you can imagine my surprise to discover that at some point in the development of this promotion, someone from the PUBG Corporation doubtlessly asked "Have we got the design for Pigsy ready yet?" and the reply was apparently "Yeah, made her real fucking sexy for you too! Just like you asked!"
This is also a rare PUBG outfit that look kind of different on a male model, than on the female model... turning into a full crop top rather than just a sexy bra.
It's also one where the chest design etc would probably get covered pretty quick the moment a player gets a vest... but I haven't had either the opportunity... or the burning desire to test that.
-wincenworks
inspired by another post, but one of my favorite things in [high] fashion is the usage of knight aesthetics, armor, weaponry, chainmail, and medieval imagery, especially in women. here are some of my favorite images using these inspirations!
i luv the recycling of historical eras and interweaving pasts and presents and futures into a single look, without losing any of them <3
survivorship bias is the best theory.
Sure, makes as much sense as any other theory behind fantasy armor.
Other survivorship bias bikini armor jokes that @eschergirls referenced (and explained) in this post last year:
~Ozzie
PS: Please be mindful that OP's blog features NSFW art.
Content warnings: Unsurprisingly all the new Mortal Kombat trailers include high definition depictions of extremely gorey violence and death. Like, gives developers PTSD extreme. I will link to the trailers, but not include them inline. I did include a more cartoony Mortal Kombat 2 fatality.
Mortal Kombat (MK) has a long history, ever since Mortal Kombat 2, of not great female outfits.
Ed Boon has had a long history justifying this with "girl power" and that its a game where women get to be kickass, and now there's been an announcement that Mortal Kombat is setting up for... yet another reboot of the narrative.
So let's investigate Ed's claims of girl power, now they're giving the world a soft reboot and have used it to do redesigns and depict the characters in their ideal situations.
The new game Announcement Trailer that the characters now have a "choice" to live in quiet, serene lives they have - until we get a montage of Shang Stun just murdering them. Notably some of them get to make token effort to fight back, but it's not until the Gameplay Trailer we see them actually bust any worthwhile moves.
In the initial trailer, Princess Kitana gets shown being carried in luxurious wagon before the crowds, accompanied by the oddly threatening Mileena. So... doesn't seem she's getting the same level of deep fulfilment the boys are.
The next time we see her - she's just like... kneeling in front of Shang Tsun and waiting to get her eyeballs gouged out with his thumbs.
In the second trailer, completely unconnected to the noble quest the boys are preparing for - she's having a battle with Mileena that seems fuelled by jealousy and paranoia.
We don't get to see any of her fatalities in the fatality montages - and while we see the boys testing one another, and building an alliance against their oppressor - we just see the girls squabbling.
Would this be an awkward time to bring up that Princess Kitana used to be 10,000 years old and expert at dealing with the machinations of the courts - unlike Fire God Liu Kang, she's been nerfed.
Milenna gets shown riding with Kitana... and implied to be her rival, but is apparently now the actual Empress. then the next time we see her it's in a half-second clip of her getting her neck snapped effortlessly.
In the second trailer she trades blows with Kitana for a while, tagging in Goro to do some big hits and then later she's in a fight with one of the boys... the hits are done by another one of the boys she tags in.
We don't get to see any of her fatalities, which is pretty disappointing given that hers have often been particularly creative with the horror angle.
Sonya doesn't appear at all... and in the second trailer she rushes in during a fight to do like a weird, flip where she suplexes someone with her legs - then runs out again. Sort of a tag team feature that she seems to do just once.
She doesn't get a line, she doesn't get to show off a move set, she doesn't make a critical move and doesn't get a fatality. Sonya Blade, the original
Fuck you Ed, stop trying to justify your own jerk off material as "girl power" retroactively and pretending that you don't think women deserve to be badass. And give the people what they want to see:
That and like female characters who are as badass and badass looking as the boys - and shown to be as driven and interesting.
Ed, make Sheeva the main character of the promotions, you coward.
-wincenworks
Raid: Shadow Legends has now reached the inevitable point of the cycle of fantasy themed game that starts with "we also have sexy ladies" marketing where its being promoted by shill accounts on the social media known as Twitter.
But it's not just the presence in the sewer. This is the Google summary:
This the Publisher's own page for it:
Strangely despite the "18+" in the top left corner, the game is still available on the infamously touchy Apple Play Store. So no, we can be very assured there will not even be so much as a nipple in it, let alone anything spicy enough to warrant any 18+ rating.
This is one of the truths behind the "sex sells" argument. It doesn't, this hasn't led to Raid gaining massive sales, dominating over games that don't use sexy marketing, etc.
If you look at the charts for Apple's top games, it's way below things like Roblox, Candy Crush Saga, Pokemon GO, Monopoly GO!, Minecraft and various other cartoony things.
This is with that creepy marketing, and well, why? Well it's just not that impressive in its niche any more.
It's just if you're having artwork made - it doesn't cost any more to add "make it horny" to the notes on female characters, and you'll definitely get endorsements from certain executives.
-wincenworks
Finally, a mainstream game with some good male armor.
You've come a long way, Prince of Persia, assuming there's no iron battle thongs in this one. I mean sort of.
I can't help but notice that our new sexy prince is a little... darker than the previous one.
And I would love it if I could just dismiss that thought as me just nitpicking, but the reality is black men have been subject to exotification for a very long time.
Which would be extra awkward in this case, given that it seems the look may have been inspired in no small part by Michael B Jordan as Killmonger in Black Panther (2018).
Lets hope that when its released, the game puts all concerns like that to rest.
-wincenworks
Sheeeeesh forgot to post my Zeld
Edit: this made it to the one of the mod devs Hiiiii~
This waited in our drafts till Tears of the Kingdom release, but please remember that BABD is always pro-Zelda in appropriate warrior attire!
~Ozzie
Okay, so over Summer Game Fest there was this promo for the game Wayfinder and I couldn't help but notice this character, Senja, seems to be designed entirely around the current appreciation of muscle mommies and... costume design from my nightmares.
Even more bafflingly... despite the design... this character is actually meant to be... a tank... not a glass cannon...
I'm not sure what the concept behind this design was... and I'm not convinced the executives cared given even the inclusion of wode paint on the arm... because... reasons?
-wincenworks
Very happy to see destroyable armor going back to it's sexy, sexy roots.
-wincenworks
Oscar Vega (@raspbeary) on: Art Station | Instagram | Twitter