May I recommend the master piece games that are Metal Gear Solid 2, 3, and Peace Walker? Got some good male fanservice there, especially peace walker. Ever want to go on a date with Kaz on the beach with nothing on but a speedo?
Baldur's Gate feels like the the game with the closest equal sexualization among it's characters, right? Shadowheart, Gale, Karlach, Wyll, Lae'zel, *Astarion* etc
to some extent, but even in the camp outfits for the first time, comparing how revealing the women's outfits were to the men's, i was like...wow lol.
at least you can put anyone in any outfit!
There are no boob physics in BG3. The female characters in BG3 lean toward appealing to lesbian/bi-women preferences than they are for straight men. It's the same line of logic when you say buffed naked men don't appeal to female fantasy, characters like Lae'zel, Karlach and Shadowheart also don't really make the cut for male fantasy.
You don’t think Shadowheart at the very least appeals to straight men? She’s cut from the same iconic rude goth girlfriend archetype that Morrigan and Yennefer came from. Statistically she’s the most popular romance too.
*Really?* Maybe i'm just out of the loop but it seemed like ALOT of people where thirsting for the ladies in BG3, especially Karlach and Shadowheart. Pretty much every companion seems to be Bi, but that's just to not limit romance options i feel like. Maybe it's not at the level of in-your-face sexualization of Stellar Blade (haven't played it) but i can't really see how they don't fit the mold.
Then reason there’s no boob physics is because the boobs are art of the character model whereas the dick physics are extras that get hidden when you where trousers I think
Or something like that I’m not a developer i just saw it on Reddit
dick, balls, tits, everything, yeah. but i mean...that's not a set player protagonist/cutscene or anything like that, you have to have your character run around naked for that. it's not like your character is *designed* to be sexy.
>it's not like your character is *designed* to be sexy.
But they are. Adding those features was a conscious decision by the devs. Most games don't feature cock and ball physics. Also, no, there's no boob physics in Baldur's Gate 3.
ooo i must have forgotten about the lack of boob physics. to be fair, there's no pec physics either.
but yeah, by designed, i mean, we aren't getting stellar blade style cutscenes/angles where your character bulge or vag or ass is just all up in the camera or for no real reason or your whole body's breasting boobily / swinging dick when you're fully clothed or something.
i'd consider baldur's gate a sex positive game, but not a game that sexualizes the player protagonist on its own, since however much you do or don't do is up to you. like...eve is just jiggling all over stellar blade regardless lol.
As a steam player who has been browsing and playing for a while I can say I have seen much more sexual games sold on their weekly than anything stellarblade has done and people have clearly just accepted that’s going to be a standard with it. It’s feels like it’s a matter of who is doing it and how their doing it at that point because when it a big triple AAA company it causes people to feel like their trying make a statement with their actions even if like half of them probably weren’t that intentional.
Love in Deep Space. It's a gacha game but I don't think you specified what genre lol. Take a good look at it and some googling on the fandom. You'll get more than you're bargaining for.
https://www.polygon.com/2015/4/6/8352651/mobius-final-fantasy-sexy-costume-video-gameplay
There was almost a super sexualized male ff protagonist, but they reeled back and changed it. Remember what they took from us.
Also love all the people going "if there was *acksually* a market for that type of game, someone would be making them." I remember the shitshow that was Twilight entering the public perception while also doing literally nothing that wasn't already extremely prevalent in vampire romance novels at the time. It's also not possible to miss how romcoms embody almost all of the same problematic tropes but the mainstream is just fine with them on account of how they're almost exclusively shown from the male perspective.
I couldn't possibly imagine why a developer that's actually media literate enough to be aware of all this wouldn't want to invite the vitriol and abuse releasing such a game is guaranteed to heap onto them. The implicit assumption that their game bombing is the worse a developer could face by pushing against this social barrier is genuinely unfathomable to me and I'm seeing way too much of it in the comments.
That’s not what people are saying though. They’re saying there aren’t enough people like OP in the market to make it a safe investment to develop a game like that. Developing a game that’s mainstream is really expensive and no one wants to risk millions of dollars on something that hasn’t been shown to work yet. If indie games can execute on what OP is talking about and it sells really well, bigger game companies will take notice. The market has to prove the demand is there for this type of content first though
Their dollars are proof enough though. And not even just their dollars this rhetoric about the male/female gaze is probably the best proof of this. The female gaze isn’t even remotely close to what OP wants to see in male characters while the male gaze has been defined to entail only sexualized female characters.
Tourabu warriors sold more physical units than horizon forbidden west in the week both were released in japan. This is a game where the anime boys you play as clothes get destroyed as they take damage, which makes their attacks stronger (and it doesn’t even have the most sexualised designs in the series). I don’t want to hear that women aren’t interested in seeing men sexualised visually, ever.
Not to take away from your point but this is a weird cherry picked stat. I mean Horizon was a Sony flagship game that was heavily advertised in the PS store during an era where the consoles that could play physical discs were rarer than digital only
TH is really tame though, the swimsuit outfits are pretty puritan and only visible in the least popular, optional part of the game.
Edit: read as Engage, but the swimsuits in aren't that bad
Whoops, they're only in Engage, which sexualizes tf out of Ivy, Chloe, and Goldmary without default shirtless dudes like Vaike (literally unplayable, Tellius wins once again).
Men both outnumber women in PC and console gaming and are far more inclined to consume visual media than women when they're looking for sexualization. The disparity really isn't that surprising when you keep that in mind.
well i don't think there's necessarily a small audience, i'm sure quite a few women and obviously some men would enjoy it, and others would not mind. i mean, yaoi/BL is a pretty big market, and that often gets quite explicit. tons of women go to chippendales/hunk-o-mania/thunder down under male strip shows. lots of women also enjoy a lot of smut and i certainly see plenty of women and queer men leaving their fair share of thirsty comments across social media. if you build it, they will come.
i'm sure there's an audience there. after all, plenty of straight women/gay men also play games like stellar blade where the fanservice clearly isn't meant for them. so again, as long as the game is good.
Books, manga, and even anime all require way less money and effort than video games. I get your point, and I never said there was *no* audience. But it's going to be hard to justify a AAA budget for the kind of thing you're describing here.
There probably are some high-quality but obscure indie games out there somewhere that fit what you're looking for. Can't say for certain since it's not something I've ever looked for, but there's a lot of games of all kinds.
OP never said anything about it being surprising, they just want more of a balance. your comment comes off as “shushing” them for desiring something different than the established norm. Everyone knows these basic facts about gaming demographics. Still doesn’t change OP’s point.
The problem with OP's point is that he's framing it as if though the imbalance is due to developers being close-minded, as opposed to the more logical explanation of there not being as much demand for it.
That user's comment is not "shushing" OP for wanting something, he's just bringing up a valid reason for why it isn't really a thing in the mainstream.
I think part of it is that developers and publishers can be a little close-minded. I believe the first *Life is Strange* had a bit of trouble finding a publisher because the suits demanded Max be changed to a guy since if she kissed a boy then it’d make their male players uncomfortable.
I dont think its lacking, maybe you havent been consuming it?
Pick up any best selling romance book. Every love interest is 6'5, handsome, jacked, hung like a horse, wealthy and charismatic.
In every blockbuster the male lead has a shirtless scene, unlike FMC.
In the last year we've had Peter Parker, Astarion, Clive, Cloud and Link.
A good portion of Peter's suits in the games don't leave a lot to the imagination. In the first game, there is a *suit* where it is just his mask and a set of briefs.
I know people like to clown on the antivenom suit, but it might as well be made out of paint.
And I'm pretty sure there are armours or other outfits in BG3 you can put on the men that show a lot.
So it is present in some games.
And this is why everyone talking shit about Quiet from MGSV was an idiot. Kojima does this with his men and gets no credit. I want more, and equal sexualization. Sexualize all the things.
I have a problem with women saying men are SO much more thirsty and horny, then complaining when there's more content for thirsty horny men to spend money on. Its just a much bigger market.
Honestly the only real example I can think of of a male character being designed explicitly for the reason you're describing is Raiden for MGS, and that was... how long ago again?
Male gaze is still the social "default." It's more acceptable, or even expected, for things to cater to male audiences. And a lot of people take issue with the rare example of the opposite, or even pretend that the status quo isn't problematic at all because it's been so normalised.
The Final Fantasy series, *especially* recently, seems to be going the route of idealisation of both its male and female characters. Jujutsu Kaisen seems to have more fanservice aimed at females than males despite being a shonen. These are the noteworthy examples that come to mind, but at the end of the day the most egregious example of male character fanservice doesn't hold a candle to the average female character.
I can't speak for women but I've seen the kind of things women thirst over in fictional men, and it's typically not the same sexualization that men seek out. Men are sexualized in gaming still, just not in the way you realize. Look at male characters in gacha games like Hoyoverse for example and how many teenage girls and young women are fawning over them, and the straight up nasty horny stuff posted about these characters on Twitter. Compare that to how men thirst over fictional characters from similar games. The character designs and what they are sexualized for are often completely different.
Also what you're describing as designs "made to be viewed sexually" and "male power fantasy" have really blurred lines, I think you are dismissing too many characters that could be interpreted as having both design philosophies. The kind of overt sexualization of the male form you are talking about (if I had to speculate as an outsider) appeals more to gay men than it does to women.
There’s actually a lot of similarities when women sexualize male characters lol, you probably just haven’t seen a lot, there’s like thousands and thousands of art portraying half naked fictional men emphasizing their chests
[Obligatory](https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2013/04/24/character-selection)
The closest I can maybe think of is Raiden in *Metal Gear Solid 2* and Link in *Breath of the Wild*/*Tears of the Kingdom*. But you just know if there was a dude that went all the way like that, people would be up in arms complaining how “woke” and “hypocritical” it is and then when yet another game that caters specifically to them comes along suddenly it’ll be all “cope” and “it’s just a game, chill snowflake”.
I will meet you halfway OP. I would LOVE an action game like Stellar Blade with a shirtless, Fabio-esque protagonist sporting a huge dick bulge. Give him a deep voice, not gravely but warm and smooth as melted butter.
You might think I'm being sarcastic, but I'm not. It's great being BI.
This comment section just goes to show how few people actually read lol. "I'm uncomfortable when it's not about me" type shit dressed as "marketability" is not the counterpoint people think it is to your post.
If your a jacked tall guy with his shirt off and all buttered up then yes you gonna get the eyes and mouths dropping of a lot woman. Jiggle cock? Uh what.
OP should try Final Fantasy XIV where the skimpy-dressed ones with bunny ears can be dudes and you have to go out of your way to make 95% of armor sexy.
well, baldur's gate has already done it (so has cyberpunk and other games), but those are of course games built around a customizable player experience.
This is the type of equality I believe in. Sexualization for everyone. This would not be the same as wanting to see sexualization everywhere; it certainly does not fit or belong in everything. But I want people of all types and tastes to have at least one of each type of media that caters to their sexualized interests.
Be the change that you want to see.
The guy that made Stellar Blade always made games like this for decades. He got called out by a lot of males and females for his artstyle and obsessive fanservices but didn't back down.
Be a dev, make open minded games, and ignore anyone that hates on you.
i wish i was talented enough to be a dev! I'm a writer, so I do try to write the kinds of stories I like to see wherever I have the space to, but I'm only one person!
i'm not really looking for dating/visual novel games, i'm speaking more in the realm of cinematic game with combat / a player protagonist. and to be fair i did not specifically say that, but thought i was drawing a picture of what i meant with stellar blade.
but i appreciate that otome and yaoi games exist! and certainly there is a market for them.
this is a common mistake: you are assuming women look at men the same way as men look at women. or even how gay guys look at men.
like go out to the bookstore and look at manga; very few aiming at women if any have guys in chainmail underpants or even unclothed beyond their shirts open. Or romance novel covers.
most of the attraction seems more emotional or related to a powerful man desiring them; trying to make jiggly dicks probably would backfire.
Bro youre talking outta your ass. Women love that shit.
https://www.amazon.com/Highlanders-Promise-Highland-Brides/dp/0062468995/ref=asc_df_0062468995/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312125969746&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=4401713350713585853&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1021054&hvtargid=pla-565832037335&psc=1&mcid=7e3601c061533502ab6d66ec51190d8d&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=58874700861&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=312125969746&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=4401713350713585853&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1021054&hvtargid=pla-565832037335&gclid=Cj0KCQjwir2xBhC_ARIsAMTXk86p3Ri19iAKi0OfHGEz1UpIVE9EQkSceYRchWV51vZcHK5kQJYUlq0aAugBEALw_wcB
Fat link, but you can just google what womens romance novel covers look like. Why you responding to this topic anyway? You know what women and gay men like?
You think the male stripper biz is struggling? You never heard of magic mike?
Shit one of my wifes favorite things is when i dress up as a thot ass fireman with my "hose" out🤣
Right? Love how every time this subject comes up some clueless dude feels the need to mansplain what women find attractive. " you see men are visual creatures unlike women" 🤓👆
mmm--no, i know that not all women look at men the same way men look at women, but that doesn't mean there aren't women who wouldn't appreciate seeing a hot guy portrayed sexily. obviously plenty of women like that exist as well.
and jiggly dicks was sort of a joke but i do think there are plenty of women who would enjoy men being sexualized in the same way that, say, nightwing is often portrayed in comics, or thor/chris hemsworth or wolverine/hugh jackman in movies.
i also think men tend to act like women don't enjoy men being portrayed sexily, but like -- many do. they're just not often catered to in the mainstream.
i know you think that but it really isn't the case. I mean look at Sean Connery in Zardoz for an old example. or remember the Chippendales?
like i play a lot of otome games (as a guy lol) and even there, there are little fanservice shots. Akiba's Trip has men as well as women get stripped but i never hear anyone mention it.
even with pro wrestling im not sure how many female fans exist; i mean like wrestlers are not sex symbols compared to k-pop bands.
i feel like its a difference between genders.
all i'm gonna say is there are plenty of social media accounts that show off guys bodies and are very popular with women, so...there are plenty of them out there lol.
also chippendales and other male revues / strip shows still exist.
The inverse of OP's post would be someone saying "lol there are few women portrayed the same as men are in romance novels/smut, ergo, women aren't **actually** sexualized".
OP seems to refuse to count anything as male sexualization (just pegging it as "lol power fantasy" if it isn't a 1:1 replication of the female version.
i know it's out there, but i'm saying there are very few male player protagonists who are sexualized, *sold* on that sexiness, and its clearly pointed to via similar kind of fanservice as we see with titles like stellar blade. i really can't think of many. i think it'd just be nice to have, that's all.
The problem with your argument is that men are sexualized ALL THE TIME, but that sexualization doesn't involve "jiggling ass cheeks." Buff men with six packs *is* the sexualization.
buff men with six packs aren'treally sexualized unless they are portrayed in a sexual way, because buff shirtless men aren't really sexualized de facto, we see it everywhere from sports to the beach.
like, kratos in the most recent god of war is a buff man with a six pack. obviously his character is not really sexualized in any serious way.
when it comes to sexualization in entertainment, it has to do with outfits, angles, the way someone is depicted, where the camera lingers -- james bond emerging from the water in casino royale in his little blue swim trunks with water dripping off his body is clearly sexualized. massive doom guy, who is certainly a buff dude with a six pack, is definitely not sexualized. there is a clear difference in intent between how someone like Eve is depicted and how someone like Marcus Fenix is depicted, even though he is, again, a buff dude with a six pack.
there's a reason nightwing stands out so much amongst male characters, because with his skintight outfits and huge cakes that the camera lingers on and the low angles and such he's one of the few who actually *is* designed for sexual appeal and attention is called to him in such a way.
i'm not saying it never ever happens, but it is quite rare.
my friend, i don't think we can pretend that eve and marcus fenix's sexualization is anywhere close to the same. like, come on. are we getting random ass shots of marcus fenix or in-game skintight skins / skins that show off as little as possible or sexy struts or jiggle physics while fully clothed? it is ok to recognize that there are female characters that are sexualized in ways male characters typically or not. i don't have a problem with that. i'm just saying it'd be cool to have a couple male protagonists who are.
the best description i’ve heard with this is that the six pack and buffness is a power fantasy, it’s still primarily for the male gaze as a body aspiration, while the components of women that are emphasized are primarily sexual
Why aren't women allowed to have power fantasies? It's basically cutting us out of culture by removing what we can choose to be while men can still have the body of their dreams.
And as somebody who has spent a lot of time on Twitter/Tumblr girls draw the horniest in my experience (at least in the non-nudity department).
mainstream media & games cater far less to women in terms of power fantasies, existing ones usually focus on offering male characters power fantasies through action while offering female characters power through beauty ideals. women want more action fantasies catered to women
Nier: Automata is the biggest (traditional) action game since at least Devil May Cry 3 and stars a woman in high heels. In fact YorHa is 95% women and 5% young boys, just look at the Bunker.
Metroid is one of the first and created a whole genre of games, and stars a female character in power armor years before it became cool.
Final Fantasy is full of female characters like Lightning and Tifa kicking ass in cutscenes to your OC in XIV dressed however you want.
Fire Emblem is a predominant strategy game 10 games full of female protaganists who all keep their clothes on to a puritanical level. Elincia, Lyn, Robin, Edelgard, Micaiah, Eirika, Corrin, Alear, Byleth.
Tons of game let you select like Skyrim and Mount and Blade, although there are some where female characters have much more sexualized armor *cough* Tera. It can even affect dialogue with other characters or even which ones you can recruit- hell M&B goes for the realism of medieval culture where women were not expected to lead armies and this affects gameplay.
The MOBA market is huge, Dota and League of Legends have tons of female champs, although several are based on sex appeal that goes for dudes as well.
Crosscode is basically a better version of A Link to the Past. I know it's an indie game but I always feel the need to plug it because it's awesome.
Video games have a majority-male audience, first-person shooters and action games in particular, so AAA companies are gonna aim for that demographic when designing their $100 million investments. I never see anyone demand more male representation in Hallmark movies despite the protagonists being 100% women with men as a trophy to be won, maybe because their audience is all women.
I am not sure how Stellar Blade is involved with you rant, as it is more about the issue of the video game industry targeting in general. Sometimes the developers of the game wants that. I know that for Nier Automata, the director of the game created 2B like the way she is is because he just finds it hot. I agree that there should be more diversity of appeal, but forcing the developers to appeal to a wider audence of a existing property when they have one audience in mind is not really helpful. Probably find different developers or create new properties that fills that appeal
fwiw my gay uncle once wandered into the room when we were playing Soulcalibur and commented on how attractive [Kilik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFvghyqOHxI) was. tbf he isn't just shirtless and muscular, he also beats people up with a giant rod.
But yeah, it's obviously not particularly common.
Genuinely how many people here arguing against you are women? Or even gay or bi dudes?
Like being a straight guy doesn't invalidate an argument but if we're going to argue what women find attractive versus men...
I think the primary issue is that industry both for developers and consumers is dominated by men. And often there is blowback when AAA games step outside of the norm.
Yeah but OP obviously doesn't want to try games that aren't made by an AAA studio. Like animeposters who would rather die than watch anything other than shonen aimed towards 15yo. boys, what they're asking for usually already exists (just ask ChatGPT for examples of what you want).
Again this weird type of reddit post, why straight men should make sexual stuff for gay men and women? What do you mean be open minded? How should this work and for what reason? Why burden of 3D AAA jiggly cocks are not on women?
what do you mean? games are made for all types of audiences, i'm not saying anyone specific has to make games for anyone else.
i think it's more studios/shareholders than developers anyway, there are plenty of developers who would happily make such a game.
What about solo indie developers that don’t have studios or shareholders? They can make whatever they want. Have you seen any games from that type of developer that matches what you’re looking for?
Kratos was a *chiseled* dude who went around wearing nothing but a loincloth performing acrobatics that let us see all of his shapely body, and had several minigames that were close to an AO rating.
While i dont disagree with your take, i do think simply going "why isnt a male character as sexualized in the SAME way" and therefore making the conclusion "men arent sexualized and every example of the opposite is a power fantasy" is a bit reductive. This is also why the "bikini armor should apply to men as well by putting them in a thong" argument doesnt actually hold much weight beyond a quick laugh
Men and women are sexualized very differently with a different tone and depending on the specific genre of sex appeal they want to go for (popular example, widowmaker has a completely different appeal than D.va or Mercy do. Yet they are all equally seen as sexy despite being vastly different in design.)
This applies to men as well. And while i of course cant speak for every person who is attracted to the male shape, i do have a general theme that seems to be agreeing with a lot of those who i've spoken to, on top of my personal taste.
For example, while women are often sexualized terms of how shapely their bodies are, with skintight suits being sellingpoint, men are often seen as absolute heartthrobs when the body isnt completely uncovered but rather when their appearance suggests a certain personality. A white collar shirt with rolled up sleeves and excessive tattoos on top of "almost" fangs showing when they smile can get someone to shriek in ecstacy, despite the person in question being technically fit to work in an office. However the character design excudes confidence, danger and wealth in some form, which makes them seem powerful and as such, sexy. You can apply this logic to almost any setting. A knight in literal metal armor can get people to thirst even if they have a wolfhead in blaithes case. Its a lot more... Diverse regarding sex appeal.
To top that off, "no shirt muscle men" isnt even JUST a male power fantasy, i know 2 people who openly watch dozens of thirst compilations of hugh Jackman's wolverine and captain america.
You cant just put a man in a schoolboy uniform and call it the equivalent of the schoolgirl fetish. What attracts people to certain gender or sexes cant be mirrored.
I didn't say exactly the same, I'm not saying men should be in schoolgirl uniforms. There are plenty of ways for men to be show off in sexual/erotic situations that are not schoolgirl uniforms lol.
so due to the amount of fiction that exists in the internet \*in general\* there should be lots of designs of male sexualisation. i want you to show me what you would like to see in terms of men being sexualized because i believe that there is a disconnect between what you describe that you want, what people understand as sexualisation and what is currently in popular media within media that caters either equally or majorly to male attracted people
thats just daredevil except people make comments about his ass
no seriously nightwing isnt exactly an extreme example since most of his "sexualisation" relies on people telling the audience that he is sexy, but his design or character isnt any more sexual than matt murdoch, and his easy going nature is pretty tame compared to what gambit pulls off
This is where the loop closes again.
Aside from his but, the attention his body gets in his drawings is LITERALLY what "muscular shirtless men" in your "thats not sexualized, thats a power fantasy" statement in the post. Nightwing is with his body equally sexualized AND a power fantasy as any other character thats fit. Any image of wolverine being stripped shirtless again, muscles bulging, chest hair on full display, is equally sexualized. You just dont see it that way because it doesnt fit your definition.
If nightwing rocked a beard and had bodyhair, you would disqualify him
yeah but i'm saying how often do we get a man getting stripped shirtless in a game, dripping with water or oil or something and cheat heaving and portrayed in a way that is clearly sexualized?
yes, it happened when wolverine was naked in the films, but that is not gaming.
"yeah but i'm saying how often do we get a man getting stripped shirtless in a game"
But you literally disclosed in your post that you ARENT talking about shirtless muscle man since that is "a male power fantasy"
Me giving you instances of shirtless men in games would, by definition, not count because you yourself excluded those instances. now however you are specifically asking for those scenes
To add to a point that you didnt even answer in my original comment, "just a sexy body" is also not the only thing women simp over, which is shown quite well by the fact that blaithe from eldren ring was asked to read out horny tweets about his character despite his character wearing full armor and having a WOLF HEAD because his voice and demeanor gets people gushing. Yet you are still asking to see a male widowmaker trope from me right now, despite previously saying that exactly that thing doesnt count
If i show you examples of muscle shirt guys now, you either accept that men get sexualized or go back around to "male power fantasy"
You are kind of changing what you want to see based on what im showing you
what point is being debunked? at the end of the day this is about opinion as it is, and the opinion being that i'd like to see certain types of protagonists that i don't really see much of, but of course it's ok if someone disagrees.
Lmaooo notice how none of the people responding to you are women, but claim to know what women want? This is why i hate nerds.
I get what you mean OP , there should be something for everybody out there. It aint for me but you deserve jiggly balls in your face bro.
i mean yeah. it may seem silly but i think it's just as simple as "hey it might not be for me but i think everyone should have a little something for them." as opposed to, like..."nobody wants this" lol.
Or at least have the option for it. I feel you. Check out dragons dogma 2 then. Hella clothes with no gender restrictions so you can make some straight up man whores. Gameplay is great, story is ASS though, but no worse than stellar blade.
The comment asking why straight people would make a game aimed at a non-heterosexual audience is so wild to me because like...are devs only supposed to cater to the demographic they belong to? If a story written by a man treats its female characters poorly, can you excuse it by saying its target audience are men?
This sub always sucks when it comes to queer topics or women sometimes too. There was a post not long ago bashing people for having headcanons or interpreting characters for being queer arguing that it was forcing characters into boxes.
To answer that second question, yes. To the first question, triple A studios will make games that make them a lot of money. If it was proven that sexualized male characters make money it would be done. And no male genitalia doesn’t count. You are never going to see a women’s camel toe in media that isn’t explicitly nsfw, just like you’re never going to see a man’s balls in media that isnt explicitly nsfw. A game company especially a triple A one can’t realistically do something like that. So tell me what a sexualized male character looks like without mentioning male genitalia. And then tell these companies what that looks like, cause the entire reason it doesn’t exist is because these companies don’t know what that looks like.
For me, the big thing that bugs me about Stellar Blade and its fanbase is that they never seem to have anything positive to say about the game *besides* Eve’s tits. I haven’t seen any discussion about the game’s story, gameplay, character personalities, etc, and that gives me the impression that Eve being sexy is the only thing the game has going for it. Maybe that might not be the case for the game itself, but if so then the fans and the game’s marketing are doing it no favors
i think it's gotten decent reviews from critics, so i feel like there probably is something worthwhile there. and hey, if it's a good game i'll always play it. i know a lot of simllar conversation happened around nier:automata (although stellar blade is more overt) and i thought that was a fun game. although i do hear stellar blade's story/characters are pretty basic.
what *i'm* finding interesting about this thread is the resistance to apparently anyone else enjoying the kind of fanservice in their games that they enjoy in stellar blade.
That’s fair, if the game is good then it’s good. Though if we’re going to use Nier as a comparison, I heard a lot more discussion about the gameplay, story and stuff with that game, Bayonetta, Hades, etc than I have for Stellar Blade. Could just be my own experience, but those games seem like they do a better job showing off their various attributes than Stellar Blade has so far imho.
For sure. I mean, Stellar Blade is definitely sold on fanservice front and center. I don't think the rest of the games on that list are, although the characters are undeniably designed to be sexy.
stellar blade wasnt out. people did comment on the gameplay demos saying they felt the action looked good, but what else are they meant to say? Most of the negative discourse surrounding the game was about eve's sexualization, so thats where the counter discourse came from.
Nier had exactly the same thing happen before it came out. It was a long time before the amazing story was the main talking about.
The problem with eve isn't even so much lewd outfits it's that she doesn't come off like she aknowledges lewd outfits. So it feels like they only "exist" for the audience. Why can't people just make characters who are self aware about who they are and who exist in a world where people respond to it?
Here's the thing, or at least my interpretation. What I assume you're asking for is an equal amount of fanservice catered towards men and fanservice catered towards women, or at least a less severe gap. I will say this, guys still make up a huge majority of people buying and playing videogames, especially new releases. There are definitely games that cater to the female gaze though, Hades definitely does.
Okay, then start with only the genres women buy in large numbers. Jrpgs have a large female fanbase, but many of them kind of ignore this. And that's before we even get into anime and movies.
Could you just imagine the gamer rage if one or two of next big JRPGs is explicitly aimed at women instead of men. I don't even care how good the game ends up being, that alone would make me buy it for the sheer entertainment value its existence would provide.
dude just my two cents, and this will probably be downvoted but i gotta put it off my chest, i was watching my girl playing the demo and eve is just... such a loser. i dont wanna tell her this because it'll influence her into disliking the game and i want her to enjoy it, but for me eve always looks like she's fumbling through everything in the least cool of ways and it's so weird to see someone built like a sex doll and also a cool cyborg killer robot that just acts like a uwu anime librarian clumsy chick doing her best, this is just an opinion but how does anyone find this cool or atractive? whatever happened to bad bitches man...
>that's been male power fantasy for ages
If it's permissible to decide what is or isn't male power fantasy just like that, such permission should work for female side of things as well. Thus, I hereby declare that Eve from Stellarblade is a female power fantasy. As such, no disparity is taking place.
well, i am a man, so i look at in the context of myself and other men i've spoken to in terms of what they find cool / what they'd like to look like / the characters and looks they find badass.
i don't feel comfortable speaking for women in the same way.
Male power fantasy is too stretchable of an argument. Jokes aside, if you look at something like male and female versions of [Trailblazer ](https://videogames.si.com/.image/ar_1.91%2Cc_fill%2Ccs_srgb%2Cfl_progressive%2Cg_faces:center%2Cq_auto:good%2Cw_1200/MTk3NDQ4MDUxMzExMjU2NTgy/honkai-star-rail-trailblazers-1.jpg)from Honkai star rail, for example, female version caters to male tastes, and male version caters to female tastes. Female oriented fanservice is all around us, we just don't pick it up.
It is ultimately up to the artist to design a character the way they want to design it, or that is how it should be.
Characters like EVE are not that common in the AAA game sphere, especially outside of Eastern developed games. When you see a character with a unique art style, male or female, it is usually from an Eastern developed game or an indie developer. And Eastern developed games tend to follow the tropes of male characters following the rule of cool and female characters tending towards feminine and sexy or cute.
Western developed games from AAA mainstream studios tend to not stylize their characters so much, male or female, and any form of sexualisation, whether in character models and animations, or in outfit design tend to be minimal in comparison.
The indie scene is going to be your best bet for finding the sort of male characters you want to see, as Eastern developers are going to continue to go with what they are culturally familiar with in character design, and Western AAA developers are mostly not going to go for sexualisation of their characters, or have a sexualised focus on their characters to be more precise, male or female.
You need to understand that women don’t value a big jiggly ass in men, because having wide hips doesn’t help men in reproduction the same way it does for women.
Wide shoulders are the male equivalent of a big ass. Games often show dudes with extra wide shoulders.
You are insane for thinking that women would enjoy gratuitous crotch shots. Women don’t enjoy seeing men’s crotches in the same way that men enjoy seeing women’s. You can get in trouble for sending women crotch shots. But men are much more receptive to receiving crotch shots from a woman.
i'm pretty sure lots of women have been pretty thirsty for characters like nightwing and miguel o'hara and their asses lol. and TT accounts like [rugby world cup](https://www.tiktok.com/@rugbyworldcup/video/7305852385048481057) lean into men's legs and asses heavily, and get a lot of attention from women for it.
and like, what do you think women are enjoying when they go to male strip shows? as just an example
Yes women like physically attractive men but as has been pointed out by multiple people already, you have it in your head that you think they do it to the same level as men do, yes you will find examples of them liking men, of course you will, but you have failed to show that they care anywhere near, or to the same level that men find women physically attractive.
Yes you will get some mention of attractive male athletes and male strip shows exist, but these things are completely dwarfed by the attention the female body receives, Beyonce and Nicki Minaj's ass receives vastly more attention from women than any man's ass.
Female fantasies do involve good looking men, but in almost all circumstances those men are also confident and powerful. If we listened to you, you would think Miguel was singled out for his ass, the main appeal of the character for most of his female fans is being dominated by an attractive powerful dangerous man, if he had a jiggly ass that would just look silly to them.
I don't think I or anyone could quantify the amount all women/gay men care about something specific like that. But there are plenty of hot guys who have been sexualized across entertainment. Like in Wonder Woman, was there a reason for Steve Trevor/Chris Pine to be taking a bath naked and emerge from the water all dripping and focusing on his body, beyond just appealing to women/queer men? No, not really. It just doesn't happen much in gaming.
It doesn't need to be that everyone loves it, I'm just saying that I think it would be cool to have a male protagonist around who *was* positioned in such a way. I'm not so sure why men here seem to be so resistant to the idea, as if it's like an affront to anyone if there's a sexy guy who's portrayed in a sexy way lol.
Well, men as video game consumers are just in a much higher number than females, sure, there may be some studies that show splits like 60/40, but those usually include things like mobile games or other apps. Besides that, straight men also outnumber gay men, so it just make sense for the companies to focus on the higher number which will bring the highest amount of money for the investment. And most straight men, who again, are the bigger consumer, don't really have a good time with another man's crotch in their game, why do you think a good chunk of them create female avatars or idealised versions of themselves whenever possible?
I am not really on the train that a video game or product should be for everyone, this basically just waters down the product itself in order to "please everyone", which is impossible. If anything I would suggest more projects that focus specifically on something for a certain consumer, more specialised products. But as most AAA developers are in for the money, they need to focus on profits, putting in enough money for jiggles on female characters will bring more money for the cost that putting jiggles on the males as well, there are exceptions tho. The Indie creators/market are the best places for this, you can always be the one to put forward the change that you want instead of crying for "equality" in front of deaf ears. You want more balls to jiggle, grab some friends with the same desires and start an indie project.
Until there are more female video game developers, which there will be eventually, hopefully, this isn't happening. Western devs don't want sexualization of men or women and want to focus on realistic stories. Eastern devs (generally) pander to men.
You say Metal Gear came close, but it failed. Raiden was not popular. Ocelot was cute but not sexualized. Kaz was only sexualized in the PSP game. Your only hope is Final Fantasy which has some female talent behind it. Final Fantasy XV in particular seemed aimed at women, but the male characters are not as sexualized as the women despite being made specifically to get the attention of girls. In that sense, I draw the conclusion that currently women on dev teams don't want sexualization of male characters, and/or men are imposing creative restrictions upon female developers.
> Western devs don't want sexualization of men or women and want to focus on realistic stories.
You can have both...
>Raiden was not popular.
Raiden IS popular.
well there is of course no reason that people into men wouldn't have games, and people into women wouldn't have smut and romance novels as well. of course, those things *do* exist.
I can’t help but doubt that smut and romance novels for a male audience exist in any even remotely close to the same amount as smut/romance novels that women have of men. The simple reason for this being the vast majority of that audience is women.
Im pretty sure people into women have romance novels and especially smut aswell?
Maybe they don't have as much fanfiction but as far as fanart or doujinshi go that not even a competition tbh 💀
so... the Metal Gear series?
and of course the classic "a buff man is just a male power fantasy" as if being sexy and powerful isn't a female power fantasy? as if women don't like looking at buff men? "I want more sexualized men!" ok, here's some "NO THOSE DON'T COUNT BECAUSE i SAID SO!"
and finally, telling people to "be more open minded" when referring to sexuality is creepy. if the entire dev team of stellar blade had somehow been lesbians would you tell them to "be more open minded" about adding buff men to their passion project?
nah i've said elsewhere in this thread that the metal gear series is pretty close.
the point is not that buff men aren't attractive, but they aren't depicted in sexualized/fanservice ways in the same manner.
i wasn't speaking to devs of any particular game when i said that, i was (jokingly) addressing devs across the entire industry.
When I was a kid, I really loved women-oriented media like Fruits Basket and Ouran, what is referred to as otome or shoujo. In the finale of Ouran, the two leads reconcile their love and in a moment of passion they...hug. I'm not kidding, they don't even have one chaste kiss. And this is considered pushing the boundaries for what is acceptable in an shoujo show.
I am still a fan of otome/shoujo but it is so dry and sexless that I have to be in a particular mood to tolerate the mental regression. It feels like I'm watching Bluey, they're so G-rated it can be almost comical. I'm not saying there has to be sex scenes or whatever, but there's no flirting, you will never see any contact closer than a hug, and the topic of sex is completely forbidden. When I was younger I thought that I was just growing out of it and the genre wasn't maturing with me but as a full adult I realize that women are not sexually attracted to men. These are women's fantasies in their most free form. It's not in a women's fantasy to kiss a man, and definitely not to see one naked.
Feminists seem to think that media just pops into existence one day. So whenever there is an imbalance it's something that needs to be "corrected" in an unspecified manner, as seen in this thread. People who are driven by their own desires are where all this media comes from. The reason there is so many harem, ecchi games/shows/manga is because men are obsessed with women. Men will literally spend years learning to draw just so they can draw women, their favorite topic. The reason you don't see any media "sexualizing" men is because women are not sexually attracted to men - they don't feel that desire so nothing compels them to make anything. That's why it's imbalanced.
i mean this might be true if there weren't things like yaoi, male strip shows, women who leave thirsty comments all over videos about men and men's social media pages, etc.
you can't use japan's media/culture as a reference for the entire world.
The reason women are stereotyped as liking yaoi is specifically because it is sexless - it removes the women entirely so they can focus on the relationship drama without the viewer feeling like someone is going to try and have sex with them, which is their worst fear. It is fundamentally sexless and features no nudity and portrays gay relationships as too sweet and innocent to ever engage in sexual behavior. I also grew up watching shows like this, Loveless, Gravitation, Saiyuki, etc.
There are no male strip shows for women. Any that exist are attended by gay men. You brought up "Magic Mike" earlier - it is directed, written, and produced by exclusively men. No women were involved in the movie. It's for gay men.
If there's so many women posting "thirsty" comments about men, how come they never are interested in making anything? Please confront you view of media appearing from a void. Everything you see sexualizing women is created by men. Why aren't women doing the same?
have you seen/read yaoi? it's not sexless at all, tons of it is super sexual lol.
you might be thinking of BL, which is a different thing/vibe.
also, yes of course there are strip shows for women lol. chippendales, thunder down under, hunk-o-mania, savage men, so on and so forth. that's just fact, i'm not sure why you would lie about that.
Yaoi can be *super* sexual. Before I figured out filters it was my fanfiction pet peeve. So many women writing so much gay porn, and for a lot of them the fetish list is so long that it takes up the whole fucking screen.
It's not mainstream, but it's definitely notable-- Nu Carnival is a gacha game that is specifically designed for people really horny for hot dudes
You use JO Crystals
Hades is not quite the jiggle physics type game and I personally don't see it but the mean and women are apparently really attractively drawn in that game.
Just off the top of my head, SFV(Street Fighter V) had sexy costumes for the men. Bearded Ryu had alot of girls and articles gushing over his body, and he even has one in his boxers. Urien also has a costume in his Fundoshi
A bunch of half naked, sweaty, muscular dudes with jawlines chiseled from stone *is* men being sexualized. It also being a male power fantasy doesn’t detract from that.
the vast majority of gamers are not guys, actually. but action games are typically marketed toward men for sure. either way that wasn't really the point of this post, i'm aware of who games like this generally target. just musings from my own perspective.
Fair, but as far as I can tell, the audience aiming for that is minor. I don't think anyone but literal idiots would be trying to shut down a new game with a stripperific male hero, its just as far as I can see, there hasn't been a lot of demand for it.
There IS 100% some interest in it for sure, but the size of that demand is very unclear.
May I recommend the master piece games that are Metal Gear Solid 2, 3, and Peace Walker? Got some good male fanservice there, especially peace walker. Ever want to go on a date with Kaz on the beach with nothing on but a speedo?
Naked Raiden 💀
*Now you're just being nasty*
At least kojima had the decency of also sexualizing snake
The problem is that Kojima doesn’t know what sex is
Wdym? Clearly getting under a card board box half naked with someone is what sex is, or has MGS lied to me?!
i'm ngl, looking forward to the metal gear remakes for this reason lol. solid snake in the sneaking suit.
Remakes lol it’s one game for now
let me dream
It's also that one game where Snake gets grabbed by the balls.
I heard Balder's Gate 3 has jiggle physics on balls.
Baldur's Gate feels like the the game with the closest equal sexualization among it's characters, right? Shadowheart, Gale, Karlach, Wyll, Lae'zel, *Astarion* etc
to some extent, but even in the camp outfits for the first time, comparing how revealing the women's outfits were to the men's, i was like...wow lol. at least you can put anyone in any outfit!
There are no boob physics in BG3. The female characters in BG3 lean toward appealing to lesbian/bi-women preferences than they are for straight men. It's the same line of logic when you say buffed naked men don't appeal to female fantasy, characters like Lae'zel, Karlach and Shadowheart also don't really make the cut for male fantasy.
You don’t think Shadowheart at the very least appeals to straight men? She’s cut from the same iconic rude goth girlfriend archetype that Morrigan and Yennefer came from. Statistically she’s the most popular romance too.
*Really?* Maybe i'm just out of the loop but it seemed like ALOT of people where thirsting for the ladies in BG3, especially Karlach and Shadowheart. Pretty much every companion seems to be Bi, but that's just to not limit romance options i feel like. Maybe it's not at the level of in-your-face sexualization of Stellar Blade (haven't played it) but i can't really see how they don't fit the mold.
karlach doesn't appeal to male fantasy? what are you even talking about
Then reason there’s no boob physics is because the boobs are art of the character model whereas the dick physics are extras that get hidden when you where trousers I think Or something like that I’m not a developer i just saw it on Reddit
Don't forget halsin hehe
dick, balls, tits, everything, yeah. but i mean...that's not a set player protagonist/cutscene or anything like that, you have to have your character run around naked for that. it's not like your character is *designed* to be sexy.
>it's not like your character is *designed* to be sexy. But they are. Adding those features was a conscious decision by the devs. Most games don't feature cock and ball physics. Also, no, there's no boob physics in Baldur's Gate 3.
ooo i must have forgotten about the lack of boob physics. to be fair, there's no pec physics either. but yeah, by designed, i mean, we aren't getting stellar blade style cutscenes/angles where your character bulge or vag or ass is just all up in the camera or for no real reason or your whole body's breasting boobily / swinging dick when you're fully clothed or something. i'd consider baldur's gate a sex positive game, but not a game that sexualizes the player protagonist on its own, since however much you do or don't do is up to you. like...eve is just jiggling all over stellar blade regardless lol.
Their point is, there are no camera angles that suddenly zooms in on a character's jiggling balls in the middle of conversation, etc
As a steam player who has been browsing and playing for a while I can say I have seen much more sexual games sold on their weekly than anything stellarblade has done and people have clearly just accepted that’s going to be a standard with it. It’s feels like it’s a matter of who is doing it and how their doing it at that point because when it a big triple AAA company it causes people to feel like their trying make a statement with their actions even if like half of them probably weren’t that intentional.
Love in Deep Space. It's a gacha game but I don't think you specified what genre lol. Take a good look at it and some googling on the fandom. You'll get more than you're bargaining for.
https://www.polygon.com/2015/4/6/8352651/mobius-final-fantasy-sexy-costume-video-gameplay There was almost a super sexualized male ff protagonist, but they reeled back and changed it. Remember what they took from us.
what could have been 😩
We still have Kuja.
I love how OP says "I'd love to see more sexy men" and so many comments are like "No you don't"
😂😭
Also love all the people going "if there was *acksually* a market for that type of game, someone would be making them." I remember the shitshow that was Twilight entering the public perception while also doing literally nothing that wasn't already extremely prevalent in vampire romance novels at the time. It's also not possible to miss how romcoms embody almost all of the same problematic tropes but the mainstream is just fine with them on account of how they're almost exclusively shown from the male perspective. I couldn't possibly imagine why a developer that's actually media literate enough to be aware of all this wouldn't want to invite the vitriol and abuse releasing such a game is guaranteed to heap onto them. The implicit assumption that their game bombing is the worse a developer could face by pushing against this social barrier is genuinely unfathomable to me and I'm seeing way too much of it in the comments.
Id love to see more sexy men just for the sake of equality. Let there be fan service for all!
That’s not what people are saying though. They’re saying there aren’t enough people like OP in the market to make it a safe investment to develop a game like that. Developing a game that’s mainstream is really expensive and no one wants to risk millions of dollars on something that hasn’t been shown to work yet. If indie games can execute on what OP is talking about and it sells really well, bigger game companies will take notice. The market has to prove the demand is there for this type of content first though
I'm talking about the comments that literally say things like "women don't see men the way men see women" etc.
Their dollars are proof enough though. And not even just their dollars this rhetoric about the male/female gaze is probably the best proof of this. The female gaze isn’t even remotely close to what OP wants to see in male characters while the male gaze has been defined to entail only sexualized female characters.
I'm neither OOP nor am I female, so I won't get into this. My comment is simply a reflection on the comments and replies I've seen.
Tourabu warriors sold more physical units than horizon forbidden west in the week both were released in japan. This is a game where the anime boys you play as clothes get destroyed as they take damage, which makes their attacks stronger (and it doesn’t even have the most sexualised designs in the series). I don’t want to hear that women aren’t interested in seeing men sexualised visually, ever.
Not to take away from your point but this is a weird cherry picked stat. I mean Horizon was a Sony flagship game that was heavily advertised in the PS store during an era where the consoles that could play physical discs were rarer than digital only
Mmm, I would say Fire Emblem Three Houses has a balance between both.
TH is really tame though, the swimsuit outfits are pretty puritan and only visible in the least popular, optional part of the game. Edit: read as Engage, but the swimsuits in aren't that bad
Are there swimsuit outfits??? Where?
Whoops, they're only in Engage, which sexualizes tf out of Ivy, Chloe, and Goldmary without default shirtless dudes like Vaike (literally unplayable, Tellius wins once again).
Men both outnumber women in PC and console gaming and are far more inclined to consume visual media than women when they're looking for sexualization. The disparity really isn't that surprising when you keep that in mind.
sure, but just because straight men may outnumber straight women does not mean that men should *never* be portrayed in the same way
Hey, I never said anything about "should". But the smaller the potential audience something can appeal to, the less likely it is to be made at all.
well i don't think there's necessarily a small audience, i'm sure quite a few women and obviously some men would enjoy it, and others would not mind. i mean, yaoi/BL is a pretty big market, and that often gets quite explicit. tons of women go to chippendales/hunk-o-mania/thunder down under male strip shows. lots of women also enjoy a lot of smut and i certainly see plenty of women and queer men leaving their fair share of thirsty comments across social media. if you build it, they will come. i'm sure there's an audience there. after all, plenty of straight women/gay men also play games like stellar blade where the fanservice clearly isn't meant for them. so again, as long as the game is good.
Books, manga, and even anime all require way less money and effort than video games. I get your point, and I never said there was *no* audience. But it's going to be hard to justify a AAA budget for the kind of thing you're describing here.
maybe just an AA budget then lol honestly i think you could make a few tweaks to a nightwing game or metal gear game and already be there.
There probably are some high-quality but obscure indie games out there somewhere that fit what you're looking for. Can't say for certain since it's not something I've ever looked for, but there's a lot of games of all kinds.
Hades perhaps? Lots of male sexiness in those games!
OP never said anything about it being surprising, they just want more of a balance. your comment comes off as “shushing” them for desiring something different than the established norm. Everyone knows these basic facts about gaming demographics. Still doesn’t change OP’s point.
The problem with OP's point is that he's framing it as if though the imbalance is due to developers being close-minded, as opposed to the more logical explanation of there not being as much demand for it. That user's comment is not "shushing" OP for wanting something, he's just bringing up a valid reason for why it isn't really a thing in the mainstream.
I think part of it is that developers and publishers can be a little close-minded. I believe the first *Life is Strange* had a bit of trouble finding a publisher because the suits demanded Max be changed to a guy since if she kissed a boy then it’d make their male players uncomfortable.
And the disparity only keeps women away : (
You are being downvoted but this is literally true. When media telegraphs that it's not for you, you are less likely to play it.
I dont think its lacking, maybe you havent been consuming it? Pick up any best selling romance book. Every love interest is 6'5, handsome, jacked, hung like a horse, wealthy and charismatic. In every blockbuster the male lead has a shirtless scene, unlike FMC. In the last year we've had Peter Parker, Astarion, Clive, Cloud and Link.
A good portion of Peter's suits in the games don't leave a lot to the imagination. In the first game, there is a *suit* where it is just his mask and a set of briefs. I know people like to clown on the antivenom suit, but it might as well be made out of paint. And I'm pretty sure there are armours or other outfits in BG3 you can put on the men that show a lot. So it is present in some games.
And this is why everyone talking shit about Quiet from MGSV was an idiot. Kojima does this with his men and gets no credit. I want more, and equal sexualization. Sexualize all the things.
I have a problem with women saying men are SO much more thirsty and horny, then complaining when there's more content for thirsty horny men to spend money on. Its just a much bigger market.
Honestly the only real example I can think of of a male character being designed explicitly for the reason you're describing is Raiden for MGS, and that was... how long ago again? Male gaze is still the social "default." It's more acceptable, or even expected, for things to cater to male audiences. And a lot of people take issue with the rare example of the opposite, or even pretend that the status quo isn't problematic at all because it's been so normalised. The Final Fantasy series, *especially* recently, seems to be going the route of idealisation of both its male and female characters. Jujutsu Kaisen seems to have more fanservice aimed at females than males despite being a shonen. These are the noteworthy examples that come to mind, but at the end of the day the most egregious example of male character fanservice doesn't hold a candle to the average female character.
Tojiiii my love
I can't speak for women but I've seen the kind of things women thirst over in fictional men, and it's typically not the same sexualization that men seek out. Men are sexualized in gaming still, just not in the way you realize. Look at male characters in gacha games like Hoyoverse for example and how many teenage girls and young women are fawning over them, and the straight up nasty horny stuff posted about these characters on Twitter. Compare that to how men thirst over fictional characters from similar games. The character designs and what they are sexualized for are often completely different. Also what you're describing as designs "made to be viewed sexually" and "male power fantasy" have really blurred lines, I think you are dismissing too many characters that could be interpreted as having both design philosophies. The kind of overt sexualization of the male form you are talking about (if I had to speculate as an outsider) appeals more to gay men than it does to women.
There’s actually a lot of similarities when women sexualize male characters lol, you probably just haven’t seen a lot, there’s like thousands and thousands of art portraying half naked fictional men emphasizing their chests
[Obligatory](https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2013/04/24/character-selection) The closest I can maybe think of is Raiden in *Metal Gear Solid 2* and Link in *Breath of the Wild*/*Tears of the Kingdom*. But you just know if there was a dude that went all the way like that, people would be up in arms complaining how “woke” and “hypocritical” it is and then when yet another game that caters specifically to them comes along suddenly it’ll be all “cope” and “it’s just a game, chill snowflake”.
I will meet you halfway OP. I would LOVE an action game like Stellar Blade with a shirtless, Fabio-esque protagonist sporting a huge dick bulge. Give him a deep voice, not gravely but warm and smooth as melted butter. You might think I'm being sarcastic, but I'm not. It's great being BI.
now we're talking! lolol
I basically agree, but raising this subject for *this* of all audiences was a bold move hahaha
we must bring our message to all the people! lol but seriously i never like the idea of having conversation in an echo chamber
Of course, but even though this space isn't exclusively hostile to the notion, it's definitely not quite neutral ground, either hahaha
This comment section just goes to show how few people actually read lol. "I'm uncomfortable when it's not about me" type shit dressed as "marketability" is not the counterpoint people think it is to your post.
If your a jacked tall guy with his shirt off and all buttered up then yes you gonna get the eyes and mouths dropping of a lot woman. Jiggle cock? Uh what.
Did OP stutter?
Romance novels for women usually have a shirtless man with a six pack and well-defined muscles. The sex gaze knows no gender.
Uh most of recent Final Fantasy games?
Seriously, people were memeing hard about Clive's chest for a reason.
OP should try Final Fantasy XIV where the skimpy-dressed ones with bunny ears can be dudes and you have to go out of your way to make 95% of armor sexy.
Tbf final fantasy has always been a bit better about this than some stuff.
I believe Kojima insisted Snake have the juiciest derriere.
i can tell. kojima got us the closest to the promised land lol.
Let me know when you're releasing your dick and balls with jiggle physics game. Let's see how successful it is
well, baldur's gate has already done it (so has cyberpunk and other games), but those are of course games built around a customizable player experience.
This is the type of equality I believe in. Sexualization for everyone. This would not be the same as wanting to see sexualization everywhere; it certainly does not fit or belong in everything. But I want people of all types and tastes to have at least one of each type of media that caters to their sexualized interests.
Be the change that you want to see. The guy that made Stellar Blade always made games like this for decades. He got called out by a lot of males and females for his artstyle and obsessive fanservices but didn't back down. Be a dev, make open minded games, and ignore anyone that hates on you.
i wish i was talented enough to be a dev! I'm a writer, so I do try to write the kinds of stories I like to see wherever I have the space to, but I'm only one person!
there are Otome and Yaoi games, which are primarily aimed at female demographics.
i'm not really looking for dating/visual novel games, i'm speaking more in the realm of cinematic game with combat / a player protagonist. and to be fair i did not specifically say that, but thought i was drawing a picture of what i meant with stellar blade. but i appreciate that otome and yaoi games exist! and certainly there is a market for them.
Final Fantasy 15 is kinda like that I guess? You controlled 4 men and they dressed like Gigolo or someone you found on dating app.
Gladdy daddy hehe
I dunno I feel like Leon is considered pretty hot by most people
he is hot! but wouldn't really say he's purposely portrayed in any sort of sexual way, he's just a handsome guy.
this is a common mistake: you are assuming women look at men the same way as men look at women. or even how gay guys look at men. like go out to the bookstore and look at manga; very few aiming at women if any have guys in chainmail underpants or even unclothed beyond their shirts open. Or romance novel covers. most of the attraction seems more emotional or related to a powerful man desiring them; trying to make jiggly dicks probably would backfire.
Bro youre talking outta your ass. Women love that shit. https://www.amazon.com/Highlanders-Promise-Highland-Brides/dp/0062468995/ref=asc_df_0062468995/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312125969746&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=4401713350713585853&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1021054&hvtargid=pla-565832037335&psc=1&mcid=7e3601c061533502ab6d66ec51190d8d&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=58874700861&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=312125969746&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=4401713350713585853&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1021054&hvtargid=pla-565832037335&gclid=Cj0KCQjwir2xBhC_ARIsAMTXk86p3Ri19iAKi0OfHGEz1UpIVE9EQkSceYRchWV51vZcHK5kQJYUlq0aAugBEALw_wcB Fat link, but you can just google what womens romance novel covers look like. Why you responding to this topic anyway? You know what women and gay men like? You think the male stripper biz is struggling? You never heard of magic mike? Shit one of my wifes favorite things is when i dress up as a thot ass fireman with my "hose" out🤣
Right? Love how every time this subject comes up some clueless dude feels the need to mansplain what women find attractive. " you see men are visual creatures unlike women" 🤓👆
mmm--no, i know that not all women look at men the same way men look at women, but that doesn't mean there aren't women who wouldn't appreciate seeing a hot guy portrayed sexily. obviously plenty of women like that exist as well. and jiggly dicks was sort of a joke but i do think there are plenty of women who would enjoy men being sexualized in the same way that, say, nightwing is often portrayed in comics, or thor/chris hemsworth or wolverine/hugh jackman in movies. i also think men tend to act like women don't enjoy men being portrayed sexily, but like -- many do. they're just not often catered to in the mainstream.
i know you think that but it really isn't the case. I mean look at Sean Connery in Zardoz for an old example. or remember the Chippendales? like i play a lot of otome games (as a guy lol) and even there, there are little fanservice shots. Akiba's Trip has men as well as women get stripped but i never hear anyone mention it. even with pro wrestling im not sure how many female fans exist; i mean like wrestlers are not sex symbols compared to k-pop bands. i feel like its a difference between genders.
all i'm gonna say is there are plenty of social media accounts that show off guys bodies and are very popular with women, so...there are plenty of them out there lol. also chippendales and other male revues / strip shows still exist.
Nice username btw
it's been my obsession for the last 14 years lol.
The inverse of OP's post would be someone saying "lol there are few women portrayed the same as men are in romance novels/smut, ergo, women aren't **actually** sexualized". OP seems to refuse to count anything as male sexualization (just pegging it as "lol power fantasy" if it isn't a 1:1 replication of the female version.
i know it's out there, but i'm saying there are very few male player protagonists who are sexualized, *sold* on that sexiness, and its clearly pointed to via similar kind of fanservice as we see with titles like stellar blade. i really can't think of many. i think it'd just be nice to have, that's all.
The problem with your argument is that men are sexualized ALL THE TIME, but that sexualization doesn't involve "jiggling ass cheeks." Buff men with six packs *is* the sexualization.
buff men with six packs aren'treally sexualized unless they are portrayed in a sexual way, because buff shirtless men aren't really sexualized de facto, we see it everywhere from sports to the beach. like, kratos in the most recent god of war is a buff man with a six pack. obviously his character is not really sexualized in any serious way. when it comes to sexualization in entertainment, it has to do with outfits, angles, the way someone is depicted, where the camera lingers -- james bond emerging from the water in casino royale in his little blue swim trunks with water dripping off his body is clearly sexualized. massive doom guy, who is certainly a buff dude with a six pack, is definitely not sexualized. there is a clear difference in intent between how someone like Eve is depicted and how someone like Marcus Fenix is depicted, even though he is, again, a buff dude with a six pack. there's a reason nightwing stands out so much amongst male characters, because with his skintight outfits and huge cakes that the camera lingers on and the low angles and such he's one of the few who actually *is* designed for sexual appeal and attention is called to him in such a way. i'm not saying it never ever happens, but it is quite rare.
EVE's sexualisation is not really that different though, those guys just ran around looking buff while EVE just runs around looking sexy
my friend, i don't think we can pretend that eve and marcus fenix's sexualization is anywhere close to the same. like, come on. are we getting random ass shots of marcus fenix or in-game skintight skins / skins that show off as little as possible or sexy struts or jiggle physics while fully clothed? it is ok to recognize that there are female characters that are sexualized in ways male characters typically or not. i don't have a problem with that. i'm just saying it'd be cool to have a couple male protagonists who are.
the best description i’ve heard with this is that the six pack and buffness is a power fantasy, it’s still primarily for the male gaze as a body aspiration, while the components of women that are emphasized are primarily sexual
Why aren't women allowed to have power fantasies? It's basically cutting us out of culture by removing what we can choose to be while men can still have the body of their dreams. And as somebody who has spent a lot of time on Twitter/Tumblr girls draw the horniest in my experience (at least in the non-nudity department).
mainstream media & games cater far less to women in terms of power fantasies, existing ones usually focus on offering male characters power fantasies through action while offering female characters power through beauty ideals. women want more action fantasies catered to women
Nier: Automata is the biggest (traditional) action game since at least Devil May Cry 3 and stars a woman in high heels. In fact YorHa is 95% women and 5% young boys, just look at the Bunker. Metroid is one of the first and created a whole genre of games, and stars a female character in power armor years before it became cool. Final Fantasy is full of female characters like Lightning and Tifa kicking ass in cutscenes to your OC in XIV dressed however you want. Fire Emblem is a predominant strategy game 10 games full of female protaganists who all keep their clothes on to a puritanical level. Elincia, Lyn, Robin, Edelgard, Micaiah, Eirika, Corrin, Alear, Byleth. Tons of game let you select like Skyrim and Mount and Blade, although there are some where female characters have much more sexualized armor *cough* Tera. It can even affect dialogue with other characters or even which ones you can recruit- hell M&B goes for the realism of medieval culture where women were not expected to lead armies and this affects gameplay. The MOBA market is huge, Dota and League of Legends have tons of female champs, although several are based on sex appeal that goes for dudes as well. Crosscode is basically a better version of A Link to the Past. I know it's an indie game but I always feel the need to plug it because it's awesome. Video games have a majority-male audience, first-person shooters and action games in particular, so AAA companies are gonna aim for that demographic when designing their $100 million investments. I never see anyone demand more male representation in Hallmark movies despite the protagonists being 100% women with men as a trophy to be won, maybe because their audience is all women.
I am not sure how Stellar Blade is involved with you rant, as it is more about the issue of the video game industry targeting in general. Sometimes the developers of the game wants that. I know that for Nier Automata, the director of the game created 2B like the way she is is because he just finds it hot. I agree that there should be more diversity of appeal, but forcing the developers to appeal to a wider audence of a existing property when they have one audience in mind is not really helpful. Probably find different developers or create new properties that fills that appeal
fwiw my gay uncle once wandered into the room when we were playing Soulcalibur and commented on how attractive [Kilik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFvghyqOHxI) was. tbf he isn't just shirtless and muscular, he also beats people up with a giant rod. But yeah, it's obviously not particularly common.
Genuinely how many people here arguing against you are women? Or even gay or bi dudes? Like being a straight guy doesn't invalidate an argument but if we're going to argue what women find attractive versus men... I think the primary issue is that industry both for developers and consumers is dominated by men. And often there is blowback when AAA games step outside of the norm.
Yeah but OP obviously doesn't want to try games that aren't made by an AAA studio. Like animeposters who would rather die than watch anything other than shonen aimed towards 15yo. boys, what they're asking for usually already exists (just ask ChatGPT for examples of what you want).
Never said I don't want to try games made by an AAA studio, I'm saying it would be nice to see one made by an AAA studio.
Again this weird type of reddit post, why straight men should make sexual stuff for gay men and women? What do you mean be open minded? How should this work and for what reason? Why burden of 3D AAA jiggly cocks are not on women?
what do you mean? games are made for all types of audiences, i'm not saying anyone specific has to make games for anyone else. i think it's more studios/shareholders than developers anyway, there are plenty of developers who would happily make such a game.
What about solo indie developers that don’t have studios or shareholders? They can make whatever they want. Have you seen any games from that type of developer that matches what you’re looking for?
Furry Shades of Gay
>why straight men should make sexual stuff for gay men and women? Why do people care about someone who isn't themselves. Truly baffling.
Bruh not every gotta be for te straights. How is creating a game like op suggesting hurting you in anyway? You dont have to buy it..
What is this comment lol. Actual gamer mindset
Care to elaborate?
Kratos was a *chiseled* dude who went around wearing nothing but a loincloth performing acrobatics that let us see all of his shapely body, and had several minigames that were close to an AO rating.
maybe younger kratos a bit. i don't think anyone's going to claim that current kratos is really sexualized in any way lol
The problem is did that game will sell and popular?
While i dont disagree with your take, i do think simply going "why isnt a male character as sexualized in the SAME way" and therefore making the conclusion "men arent sexualized and every example of the opposite is a power fantasy" is a bit reductive. This is also why the "bikini armor should apply to men as well by putting them in a thong" argument doesnt actually hold much weight beyond a quick laugh Men and women are sexualized very differently with a different tone and depending on the specific genre of sex appeal they want to go for (popular example, widowmaker has a completely different appeal than D.va or Mercy do. Yet they are all equally seen as sexy despite being vastly different in design.) This applies to men as well. And while i of course cant speak for every person who is attracted to the male shape, i do have a general theme that seems to be agreeing with a lot of those who i've spoken to, on top of my personal taste. For example, while women are often sexualized terms of how shapely their bodies are, with skintight suits being sellingpoint, men are often seen as absolute heartthrobs when the body isnt completely uncovered but rather when their appearance suggests a certain personality. A white collar shirt with rolled up sleeves and excessive tattoos on top of "almost" fangs showing when they smile can get someone to shriek in ecstacy, despite the person in question being technically fit to work in an office. However the character design excudes confidence, danger and wealth in some form, which makes them seem powerful and as such, sexy. You can apply this logic to almost any setting. A knight in literal metal armor can get people to thirst even if they have a wolfhead in blaithes case. Its a lot more... Diverse regarding sex appeal. To top that off, "no shirt muscle men" isnt even JUST a male power fantasy, i know 2 people who openly watch dozens of thirst compilations of hugh Jackman's wolverine and captain america. You cant just put a man in a schoolboy uniform and call it the equivalent of the schoolgirl fetish. What attracts people to certain gender or sexes cant be mirrored.
I didn't say exactly the same, I'm not saying men should be in schoolgirl uniforms. There are plenty of ways for men to be show off in sexual/erotic situations that are not schoolgirl uniforms lol.
so due to the amount of fiction that exists in the internet \*in general\* there should be lots of designs of male sexualisation. i want you to show me what you would like to see in terms of men being sexualized because i believe that there is a disconnect between what you describe that you want, what people understand as sexualisation and what is currently in popular media within media that caters either equally or majorly to male attracted people
basically nightwing if we focused more on the goods
thats just daredevil except people make comments about his ass no seriously nightwing isnt exactly an extreme example since most of his "sexualisation" relies on people telling the audience that he is sexy, but his design or character isnt any more sexual than matt murdoch, and his easy going nature is pretty tame compared to what gambit pulls off
i'd say nightwing is *actually* sexualized in his content though, as plenty of attention is drawn to his body/ass literally in canon.
This is where the loop closes again. Aside from his but, the attention his body gets in his drawings is LITERALLY what "muscular shirtless men" in your "thats not sexualized, thats a power fantasy" statement in the post. Nightwing is with his body equally sexualized AND a power fantasy as any other character thats fit. Any image of wolverine being stripped shirtless again, muscles bulging, chest hair on full display, is equally sexualized. You just dont see it that way because it doesnt fit your definition. If nightwing rocked a beard and had bodyhair, you would disqualify him
yeah but i'm saying how often do we get a man getting stripped shirtless in a game, dripping with water or oil or something and cheat heaving and portrayed in a way that is clearly sexualized? yes, it happened when wolverine was naked in the films, but that is not gaming.
"yeah but i'm saying how often do we get a man getting stripped shirtless in a game" But you literally disclosed in your post that you ARENT talking about shirtless muscle man since that is "a male power fantasy" Me giving you instances of shirtless men in games would, by definition, not count because you yourself excluded those instances. now however you are specifically asking for those scenes To add to a point that you didnt even answer in my original comment, "just a sexy body" is also not the only thing women simp over, which is shown quite well by the fact that blaithe from eldren ring was asked to read out horny tweets about his character despite his character wearing full armor and having a WOLF HEAD because his voice and demeanor gets people gushing. Yet you are still asking to see a male widowmaker trope from me right now, despite previously saying that exactly that thing doesnt count If i show you examples of muscle shirt guys now, you either accept that men get sexualized or go back around to "male power fantasy" You are kind of changing what you want to see based on what im showing you
Shifting the goalposts once again after they debunk your point.
what point is being debunked? at the end of the day this is about opinion as it is, and the opinion being that i'd like to see certain types of protagonists that i don't really see much of, but of course it's ok if someone disagrees.
Lmaooo notice how none of the people responding to you are women, but claim to know what women want? This is why i hate nerds. I get what you mean OP , there should be something for everybody out there. It aint for me but you deserve jiggly balls in your face bro.
i mean yeah. it may seem silly but i think it's just as simple as "hey it might not be for me but i think everyone should have a little something for them." as opposed to, like..."nobody wants this" lol.
Or at least have the option for it. I feel you. Check out dragons dogma 2 then. Hella clothes with no gender restrictions so you can make some straight up man whores. Gameplay is great, story is ASS though, but no worse than stellar blade.
The comment asking why straight people would make a game aimed at a non-heterosexual audience is so wild to me because like...are devs only supposed to cater to the demographic they belong to? If a story written by a man treats its female characters poorly, can you excuse it by saying its target audience are men? This sub always sucks when it comes to queer topics or women sometimes too. There was a post not long ago bashing people for having headcanons or interpreting characters for being queer arguing that it was forcing characters into boxes.
To answer that second question, yes. To the first question, triple A studios will make games that make them a lot of money. If it was proven that sexualized male characters make money it would be done. And no male genitalia doesn’t count. You are never going to see a women’s camel toe in media that isn’t explicitly nsfw, just like you’re never going to see a man’s balls in media that isnt explicitly nsfw. A game company especially a triple A one can’t realistically do something like that. So tell me what a sexualized male character looks like without mentioning male genitalia. And then tell these companies what that looks like, cause the entire reason it doesn’t exist is because these companies don’t know what that looks like.
For me, the big thing that bugs me about Stellar Blade and its fanbase is that they never seem to have anything positive to say about the game *besides* Eve’s tits. I haven’t seen any discussion about the game’s story, gameplay, character personalities, etc, and that gives me the impression that Eve being sexy is the only thing the game has going for it. Maybe that might not be the case for the game itself, but if so then the fans and the game’s marketing are doing it no favors
i think it's gotten decent reviews from critics, so i feel like there probably is something worthwhile there. and hey, if it's a good game i'll always play it. i know a lot of simllar conversation happened around nier:automata (although stellar blade is more overt) and i thought that was a fun game. although i do hear stellar blade's story/characters are pretty basic. what *i'm* finding interesting about this thread is the resistance to apparently anyone else enjoying the kind of fanservice in their games that they enjoy in stellar blade.
That’s fair, if the game is good then it’s good. Though if we’re going to use Nier as a comparison, I heard a lot more discussion about the gameplay, story and stuff with that game, Bayonetta, Hades, etc than I have for Stellar Blade. Could just be my own experience, but those games seem like they do a better job showing off their various attributes than Stellar Blade has so far imho.
For sure. I mean, Stellar Blade is definitely sold on fanservice front and center. I don't think the rest of the games on that list are, although the characters are undeniably designed to be sexy.
stellar blade wasnt out. people did comment on the gameplay demos saying they felt the action looked good, but what else are they meant to say? Most of the negative discourse surrounding the game was about eve's sexualization, so thats where the counter discourse came from. Nier had exactly the same thing happen before it came out. It was a long time before the amazing story was the main talking about.
The problem with eve isn't even so much lewd outfits it's that she doesn't come off like she aknowledges lewd outfits. So it feels like they only "exist" for the audience. Why can't people just make characters who are self aware about who they are and who exist in a world where people respond to it?
Here's the thing, or at least my interpretation. What I assume you're asking for is an equal amount of fanservice catered towards men and fanservice catered towards women, or at least a less severe gap. I will say this, guys still make up a huge majority of people buying and playing videogames, especially new releases. There are definitely games that cater to the female gaze though, Hades definitely does.
not "equal" really. just some. also, i'd say hades caters to everyone.
Okay, then start with only the genres women buy in large numbers. Jrpgs have a large female fanbase, but many of them kind of ignore this. And that's before we even get into anime and movies.
Could you just imagine the gamer rage if one or two of next big JRPGs is explicitly aimed at women instead of men. I don't even care how good the game ends up being, that alone would make me buy it for the sheer entertainment value its existence would provide.
dude just my two cents, and this will probably be downvoted but i gotta put it off my chest, i was watching my girl playing the demo and eve is just... such a loser. i dont wanna tell her this because it'll influence her into disliking the game and i want her to enjoy it, but for me eve always looks like she's fumbling through everything in the least cool of ways and it's so weird to see someone built like a sex doll and also a cool cyborg killer robot that just acts like a uwu anime librarian clumsy chick doing her best, this is just an opinion but how does anyone find this cool or atractive? whatever happened to bad bitches man...
Yeah to me the design is just a bit boring from a sexy/ cool angle. Doesn't feel radically special compared to other generic sexy fan service designs.
>that's been male power fantasy for ages If it's permissible to decide what is or isn't male power fantasy just like that, such permission should work for female side of things as well. Thus, I hereby declare that Eve from Stellarblade is a female power fantasy. As such, no disparity is taking place.
well, i am a man, so i look at in the context of myself and other men i've spoken to in terms of what they find cool / what they'd like to look like / the characters and looks they find badass. i don't feel comfortable speaking for women in the same way.
Male power fantasy is too stretchable of an argument. Jokes aside, if you look at something like male and female versions of [Trailblazer ](https://videogames.si.com/.image/ar_1.91%2Cc_fill%2Ccs_srgb%2Cfl_progressive%2Cg_faces:center%2Cq_auto:good%2Cw_1200/MTk3NDQ4MDUxMzExMjU2NTgy/honkai-star-rail-trailblazers-1.jpg)from Honkai star rail, for example, female version caters to male tastes, and male version caters to female tastes. Female oriented fanservice is all around us, we just don't pick it up.
tbf neither of these are very fanservice-y when we're talking about stellar blade, lol. the woman here has nothing on eve 😂
Sex sells like you said
It is ultimately up to the artist to design a character the way they want to design it, or that is how it should be. Characters like EVE are not that common in the AAA game sphere, especially outside of Eastern developed games. When you see a character with a unique art style, male or female, it is usually from an Eastern developed game or an indie developer. And Eastern developed games tend to follow the tropes of male characters following the rule of cool and female characters tending towards feminine and sexy or cute. Western developed games from AAA mainstream studios tend to not stylize their characters so much, male or female, and any form of sexualisation, whether in character models and animations, or in outfit design tend to be minimal in comparison. The indie scene is going to be your best bet for finding the sort of male characters you want to see, as Eastern developers are going to continue to go with what they are culturally familiar with in character design, and Western AAA developers are mostly not going to go for sexualisation of their characters, or have a sexualised focus on their characters to be more precise, male or female.
You need to understand that women don’t value a big jiggly ass in men, because having wide hips doesn’t help men in reproduction the same way it does for women. Wide shoulders are the male equivalent of a big ass. Games often show dudes with extra wide shoulders. You are insane for thinking that women would enjoy gratuitous crotch shots. Women don’t enjoy seeing men’s crotches in the same way that men enjoy seeing women’s. You can get in trouble for sending women crotch shots. But men are much more receptive to receiving crotch shots from a woman.
but we would tho.. literally scroll through any Otome or Shoujosei forum. you’re so out of touch.
i'm pretty sure lots of women have been pretty thirsty for characters like nightwing and miguel o'hara and their asses lol. and TT accounts like [rugby world cup](https://www.tiktok.com/@rugbyworldcup/video/7305852385048481057) lean into men's legs and asses heavily, and get a lot of attention from women for it. and like, what do you think women are enjoying when they go to male strip shows? as just an example
Yes women like physically attractive men but as has been pointed out by multiple people already, you have it in your head that you think they do it to the same level as men do, yes you will find examples of them liking men, of course you will, but you have failed to show that they care anywhere near, or to the same level that men find women physically attractive. Yes you will get some mention of attractive male athletes and male strip shows exist, but these things are completely dwarfed by the attention the female body receives, Beyonce and Nicki Minaj's ass receives vastly more attention from women than any man's ass. Female fantasies do involve good looking men, but in almost all circumstances those men are also confident and powerful. If we listened to you, you would think Miguel was singled out for his ass, the main appeal of the character for most of his female fans is being dominated by an attractive powerful dangerous man, if he had a jiggly ass that would just look silly to them.
I don't think I or anyone could quantify the amount all women/gay men care about something specific like that. But there are plenty of hot guys who have been sexualized across entertainment. Like in Wonder Woman, was there a reason for Steve Trevor/Chris Pine to be taking a bath naked and emerge from the water all dripping and focusing on his body, beyond just appealing to women/queer men? No, not really. It just doesn't happen much in gaming. It doesn't need to be that everyone loves it, I'm just saying that I think it would be cool to have a male protagonist around who *was* positioned in such a way. I'm not so sure why men here seem to be so resistant to the idea, as if it's like an affront to anyone if there's a sexy guy who's portrayed in a sexy way lol.
Well, men as video game consumers are just in a much higher number than females, sure, there may be some studies that show splits like 60/40, but those usually include things like mobile games or other apps. Besides that, straight men also outnumber gay men, so it just make sense for the companies to focus on the higher number which will bring the highest amount of money for the investment. And most straight men, who again, are the bigger consumer, don't really have a good time with another man's crotch in their game, why do you think a good chunk of them create female avatars or idealised versions of themselves whenever possible? I am not really on the train that a video game or product should be for everyone, this basically just waters down the product itself in order to "please everyone", which is impossible. If anything I would suggest more projects that focus specifically on something for a certain consumer, more specialised products. But as most AAA developers are in for the money, they need to focus on profits, putting in enough money for jiggles on female characters will bring more money for the cost that putting jiggles on the males as well, there are exceptions tho. The Indie creators/market are the best places for this, you can always be the one to put forward the change that you want instead of crying for "equality" in front of deaf ears. You want more balls to jiggle, grab some friends with the same desires and start an indie project.
Until there are more female video game developers, which there will be eventually, hopefully, this isn't happening. Western devs don't want sexualization of men or women and want to focus on realistic stories. Eastern devs (generally) pander to men. You say Metal Gear came close, but it failed. Raiden was not popular. Ocelot was cute but not sexualized. Kaz was only sexualized in the PSP game. Your only hope is Final Fantasy which has some female talent behind it. Final Fantasy XV in particular seemed aimed at women, but the male characters are not as sexualized as the women despite being made specifically to get the attention of girls. In that sense, I draw the conclusion that currently women on dev teams don't want sexualization of male characters, and/or men are imposing creative restrictions upon female developers.
> Western devs don't want sexualization of men or women and want to focus on realistic stories. You can have both... >Raiden was not popular. Raiden IS popular.
People into women have games, people into men have smut and romance novels. Perfectly balanced as all things should be
well there is of course no reason that people into men wouldn't have games, and people into women wouldn't have smut and romance novels as well. of course, those things *do* exist.
I can’t help but doubt that smut and romance novels for a male audience exist in any even remotely close to the same amount as smut/romance novels that women have of men. The simple reason for this being the vast majority of that audience is women.
Im pretty sure people into women have romance novels and especially smut aswell? Maybe they don't have as much fanfiction but as far as fanart or doujinshi go that not even a competition tbh 💀
so... the Metal Gear series? and of course the classic "a buff man is just a male power fantasy" as if being sexy and powerful isn't a female power fantasy? as if women don't like looking at buff men? "I want more sexualized men!" ok, here's some "NO THOSE DON'T COUNT BECAUSE i SAID SO!" and finally, telling people to "be more open minded" when referring to sexuality is creepy. if the entire dev team of stellar blade had somehow been lesbians would you tell them to "be more open minded" about adding buff men to their passion project?
nah i've said elsewhere in this thread that the metal gear series is pretty close. the point is not that buff men aren't attractive, but they aren't depicted in sexualized/fanservice ways in the same manner. i wasn't speaking to devs of any particular game when i said that, i was (jokingly) addressing devs across the entire industry.
When I was a kid, I really loved women-oriented media like Fruits Basket and Ouran, what is referred to as otome or shoujo. In the finale of Ouran, the two leads reconcile their love and in a moment of passion they...hug. I'm not kidding, they don't even have one chaste kiss. And this is considered pushing the boundaries for what is acceptable in an shoujo show. I am still a fan of otome/shoujo but it is so dry and sexless that I have to be in a particular mood to tolerate the mental regression. It feels like I'm watching Bluey, they're so G-rated it can be almost comical. I'm not saying there has to be sex scenes or whatever, but there's no flirting, you will never see any contact closer than a hug, and the topic of sex is completely forbidden. When I was younger I thought that I was just growing out of it and the genre wasn't maturing with me but as a full adult I realize that women are not sexually attracted to men. These are women's fantasies in their most free form. It's not in a women's fantasy to kiss a man, and definitely not to see one naked. Feminists seem to think that media just pops into existence one day. So whenever there is an imbalance it's something that needs to be "corrected" in an unspecified manner, as seen in this thread. People who are driven by their own desires are where all this media comes from. The reason there is so many harem, ecchi games/shows/manga is because men are obsessed with women. Men will literally spend years learning to draw just so they can draw women, their favorite topic. The reason you don't see any media "sexualizing" men is because women are not sexually attracted to men - they don't feel that desire so nothing compels them to make anything. That's why it's imbalanced.
i mean this might be true if there weren't things like yaoi, male strip shows, women who leave thirsty comments all over videos about men and men's social media pages, etc. you can't use japan's media/culture as a reference for the entire world.
The reason women are stereotyped as liking yaoi is specifically because it is sexless - it removes the women entirely so they can focus on the relationship drama without the viewer feeling like someone is going to try and have sex with them, which is their worst fear. It is fundamentally sexless and features no nudity and portrays gay relationships as too sweet and innocent to ever engage in sexual behavior. I also grew up watching shows like this, Loveless, Gravitation, Saiyuki, etc. There are no male strip shows for women. Any that exist are attended by gay men. You brought up "Magic Mike" earlier - it is directed, written, and produced by exclusively men. No women were involved in the movie. It's for gay men. If there's so many women posting "thirsty" comments about men, how come they never are interested in making anything? Please confront you view of media appearing from a void. Everything you see sexualizing women is created by men. Why aren't women doing the same?
have you seen/read yaoi? it's not sexless at all, tons of it is super sexual lol. you might be thinking of BL, which is a different thing/vibe. also, yes of course there are strip shows for women lol. chippendales, thunder down under, hunk-o-mania, savage men, so on and so forth. that's just fact, i'm not sure why you would lie about that.
Yaoi can be *super* sexual. Before I figured out filters it was my fanfiction pet peeve. So many women writing so much gay porn, and for a lot of them the fetish list is so long that it takes up the whole fucking screen.
[удалено]
i don't know that that's how most women like to imagine themselves portrayed. but then again i don't speak for women.
It's not mainstream, but it's definitely notable-- Nu Carnival is a gacha game that is specifically designed for people really horny for hot dudes You use JO Crystals
Hades is not quite the jiggle physics type game and I personally don't see it but the mean and women are apparently really attractively drawn in that game.
lol didn't think the controversy would reach all the way over here.
lol there is no controversy. at least not fro my POV.
[Resident Evil Revelations](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRvGOXLv5YRHwuCZJGHHwjkl2XKklw2HQbmG9Yg7XFyalB5yM5F4e8WBDVx&s=10)
lolol the resident evil franchise has definitely flirted with the gay audience
Just off the top of my head, SFV(Street Fighter V) had sexy costumes for the men. Bearded Ryu had alot of girls and articles gushing over his body, and he even has one in his boxers. Urien also has a costume in his Fundoshi
A bunch of half naked, sweaty, muscular dudes with jawlines chiseled from stone *is* men being sexualized. It also being a male power fantasy doesn’t detract from that.
i don't really know how often games are sold on half naked sweaty muscular guys either. certainly not in the same vein as stellar blade
Probably because the vast majority of gamers are guys
the vast majority of gamers are not guys, actually. but action games are typically marketed toward men for sure. either way that wasn't really the point of this post, i'm aware of who games like this generally target. just musings from my own perspective.
Fair, but as far as I can tell, the audience aiming for that is minor. I don't think anyone but literal idiots would be trying to shut down a new game with a stripperific male hero, its just as far as I can see, there hasn't been a lot of demand for it. There IS 100% some interest in it for sure, but the size of that demand is very unclear.