SE is in this for player appeal, and their own numbers coupled with personal observations is pretty convincing. Pretty, "dainty", female characters outweigh the Roegadyn females, Highlander females, and Elezen females by a huge margin - though not as widely with Elezen females. Past research in MMOs has demonstrated that players who choose to play male characters more often than not prefer to be tall and buff looking, while players that choose female characters gravitate towards pretty and petite. Even when the player base complains about sexual dimorphism the trend remains.Â
SE wants the appeal of XIV to continue to build, and appealing to players desire to play petite, cute female avatars or a ridiculously tall piece of man is a good way to do it. Are their exceptions? Of course there are, but honestly it's remarkable we even have something like Roegadyn females as a choice at all.Â
The past few years has seen a lot of blame pointed at the video game industry as a source of sexism and misogyny, but video games are just a product of culture, they're not a starting point. They reflect what's already there, and anyone looking to build player appeal in XIV can see plain as day what most people want to play as.
I just consider us lucky that they have scales.
SE wants the appeal of XIV to continue to build, and appealing to players desire to play petite, cute female avatars or a ridiculously tall piece of man is a good way to do it. Are their exceptions? Of course there are, but honestly it's remarkable we even have something like Roegadyn females as a choice at all.Â
The past few years has seen a lot of blame pointed at the video game industry as a source of sexism and misogyny, but video games are just a product of culture, they're not a starting point. They reflect what's already there, and anyone looking to build player appeal in XIV can see plain as day what most people want to play as.
I just consider us lucky that they have scales.