Thread Closed
Think people should remember this is a Japanese game therefore will have an aesthetic of that region of the world for their entertainment. (See movies, cartoons/anime, other games, toys, and so on.) Not to mention the US is a 'secondary' market so data from those servers would likely be considered secondary to data from Japanese servers. Before 2.0 there was not even female Highlander or Roegadyn to be played. (Nor Miqo'te males.)
The smaller and softer female vs Male is a consistent trope for all the races except Lalafell which fall into the "cute race" trope. Even the "amazon" Roegadyn females can be dropped short enough to be confused with Highlanders. Female character models actually have the largest height change allowance (Roegadyn females being the cap of that for now).
Really... we don't know exactly how different the Au Ra will be until the benchmark drops. So I don't think they caved to much of anything other than probably going to Idea #56049 out of 100000 because it looks like it will be popular. I doubt they scrapped initial designs for numbers, I bet the current look was one of the many designs presented before fan data.
Now going into more than aesthetics, what makes the character quality is not the looks. Do people love the Admiral because "amazon woman" or because she is just damn awesome in every thing else. Edda was cute and petite but she obviously was not someone to be messed with, deluded as she was. Y'stola is 'cute' but by far one of the most imposing members of the scions. Yda honestly is the 'muscle' of the scions, while not the brightest (well.. honestly I think she just pretends to be foolish to banter with her Lalafell bud.)
Of course there are examples of more "Amazonian women" such as a certain axe wielding scholar Roegadyn or the Gladiator in the Hildy lines, but both of their 'physical traits' get sidelined by the actual characters.
Most of the Archetypes that color our perspective on their physical traits come more from how the characters are played rather than their physical traits. We have so many 'cute lalafell' we end up not being able to take them seriously, which is why ones that don't behave always cute are well loved. We have so many ... uh... Catbois and Catgirls we end up seeing the whole race as those tropes rather than the way they are presented in the game. A lot of midlander females are soft spoken and shy so we end up seeing them as frail. Sadly, this trend is why folks are seeing Au Ra as frail and cute despite all the evidence we have so far is they are anything but that. Yay, for stereotypes and tropes!
(Also the inverse exists everyone expects Roegadyn and Highlanders to be brutal fighters etc.)
Mind you... I am not denying folks are attracted to certain body types. Just was discussing other aspects of like or dislike of races other than how warm folks get down there.
The smaller and softer female vs Male is a consistent trope for all the races except Lalafell which fall into the "cute race" trope. Even the "amazon" Roegadyn females can be dropped short enough to be confused with Highlanders. Female character models actually have the largest height change allowance (Roegadyn females being the cap of that for now).
Really... we don't know exactly how different the Au Ra will be until the benchmark drops. So I don't think they caved to much of anything other than probably going to Idea #56049 out of 100000 because it looks like it will be popular. I doubt they scrapped initial designs for numbers, I bet the current look was one of the many designs presented before fan data.
Now going into more than aesthetics, what makes the character quality is not the looks. Do people love the Admiral because "amazon woman" or because she is just damn awesome in every thing else. Edda was cute and petite but she obviously was not someone to be messed with, deluded as she was. Y'stola is 'cute' but by far one of the most imposing members of the scions. Yda honestly is the 'muscle' of the scions, while not the brightest (well.. honestly I think she just pretends to be foolish to banter with her Lalafell bud.)
Of course there are examples of more "Amazonian women" such as a certain axe wielding scholar Roegadyn or the Gladiator in the Hildy lines, but both of their 'physical traits' get sidelined by the actual characters.
Most of the Archetypes that color our perspective on their physical traits come more from how the characters are played rather than their physical traits. We have so many 'cute lalafell' we end up not being able to take them seriously, which is why ones that don't behave always cute are well loved. We have so many ... uh... Catbois and Catgirls we end up seeing the whole race as those tropes rather than the way they are presented in the game. A lot of midlander females are soft spoken and shy so we end up seeing them as frail. Sadly, this trend is why folks are seeing Au Ra as frail and cute despite all the evidence we have so far is they are anything but that. Yay, for stereotypes and tropes!
(Also the inverse exists everyone expects Roegadyn and Highlanders to be brutal fighters etc.)
Mind you... I am not denying folks are attracted to certain body types. Just was discussing other aspects of like or dislike of races other than how warm folks get down there.