#. yes i know this isnt her default form(????) i suppose but i am not looking i do not see it

[wolfieolfie]

cringetober day 13: creepypasta

LAZARIIIIIIIII

[maelien]

stupid dumb Blizzard/Overwatch discourse below the cut

okay so i never thought i would ever post about discourse, but here i am. but since literally nobody wants a giant thing on their dash, im gonna put this below the cut. i apologise to anyone on mobile who has to scroll past this. anyways this post is about this:

by @yubird​

btw im in agreement with the statement of this image, so if you dont care, feel free to scroll by. i dont expect anyone to read this tbh.

first of all, i want to preface this with the fact that while i do not play Overwatch, nor do i follow any of the lore or news, i still want to present some criticism because by being a public company, Blizzard is showing their creations to the world, which are therefore open for all kinds of feedback, positive or negative or even constructive. this isnt me bashing on Blizzard; i think theyre doing great things with the amounts of diversity in Overwatch, and from what i know, they pay a lot of attention to detail when it comes to game design and extra assets and whatnot. i just want to critique the same face syndrome that a lot of people have been pointing out lately.

so earlier today i got in a debate with some friends of mine about the idea that all Overwatch women have the same face. im gonna compile some of my friends’ arguments and my own arguments here, as well as some counter-arguments which were presented to me by my friends or by people discussing this topic online.

this is just because i feel like everyone who points out this same face syndrome doesnt really know why it bothers them, so here are some points i want to make.

first of all, upon asking my friend what they thought of the debate, they said they agree that all the Overwatch women’s faces look the same, stating that they knew this because “i have eyes,” as they put it. i just thought this would be a funny thing to put here, and it in no way is meant to derail the legitimate arguments which they or i have.

some other things this friend said (slightly edited for grammar or missing context from previous statements):

“the female hero that looks the most different is Zarya but her face is just wider, they still all have very similar nose and eye shapes, their facial designs are very plain in-game”

“it’s similar to frozen in how yes they look different but they all look very similar”

“in the cinematics the women look very different but in-game it’s almost like there was one basic model that was slightly tweaked for each character” (this is a point that i will mention and address later on)

“like damn if youre gonna have ‘em look different for the cinematography you cant adapt even just a little more of that into the game itself?”

“did u notice how small the noses on the black characters were” (this is addressing the models which Blizzard released, which are seen below)

another friend of mine had these statements to offer (slightly edited for grammar or missing context from previous statements):

“Okay, like, how many paintings or images or films or books have been about ugly females? The answer is not whole hell of a lot. Art, in general whether we’re talking about games, books, paintings, poems, films, they all have a problem with making ugly female characters. Even characters that are supposed to be “ugly” are often just a different shades of beauty and people find that beauty later. Meanwhile, a man could use his ugliness to his advantage, like Shrek, or the Beast, two ugly characters that frighten and intimidate people. I can’t think of any other “ugly” female character in the popular culture other than Fiona [from Shrek], maybe you have one?”

“Overwatch is guilty, yes, but it’s more indicative of a systemic problem overall. When humans tell stories about females, their beauty in some form or another has to be addressed” (i appreciated this friend’s application of this issue to the bigger picture outside of Overwatch because it definitely needed to be addressed alongside Blizzard’s same face syndrome)

a third friend had these things to say on the topic (slightly edited for grammar or missing context from previous statements):

“I suppose they do only add traditionally beautiful girls on there. It’s totally fair to say that they put more effort into the model design of the dudes than the girls.”

“Yah there is definitely a focus on accessories and ensuring feminine traits in the girls.”

“In general creating more variety in the way people are presented helps everyone.”

some counter-arguments i received were (slightly edited for grammar or missing context from previous statements):

“Mercy has shallow cheeks and a long face, Mei has a short face with chubby cheeks, Ana has a distinct grandma face” (i personally feel like Ana looks about 35 at most)

“Mercy has a pointy chin, Pharah has a flat square chin”

“Tracer has a flatter round chin”

“Even that overlay of Mercy’s face onto [Brigitte]… The jaw? Different. Mercy has shallower cheeks. The chin? Not even close to the same shape. The nose? Mercy has a much thinner, longer nose.” (referring to the image below)

(from @arimarushunya​)

i received other counter-arguments that were made during a verbal conversation, but i dont remember them. however, i will provide counter-arguments below during my argument.

i am pulling the next part of this post from a long discussion i had with a friend about this matter, and they provided good counter-arguments that are very important to include during my argument because i do not want anyone to think that i am not aware of other ways that people may look at this, nor do i wish for anyone to think that i refuse to listen to other views.

i agree with some of the counter-arguments, but i still stand by my criticism that there could be more effort put in. do i expect that, though? absolutely not. this is just my opinion and nothing more. just a commentary on some person’s irrelevant blog.

first of all, the fact that many of the men’s faces look literally so different from each other needs to be addressed. each one is very unique, or at least a good portion of them. for example:

Roadhog has a really round head.

Junkrat has a banana-shaped head.

McCree has a square jaw.

Hanzo has a very strong brow and jawline.

Torbjorn has a very compressed face.

Winston is a fucking gorilla for chrissake.

many of the male characters in Overwatch have something very unique and discernible from the other male characters. while i do concede that some male models are similar to each other, and some male models wear masks or are not even human (my mention of Winston is half-joking, as i know many people consider him to be a different category, but i also think it should be noted that there are no non-human (or at least, non-human-like) women in Overwatch), i think that the amount of distinctly different male models in comparison to the amount of distinctly different female models is….. annoying. lazy. boring. embarrassing, even.

my biggest point is that the people who have an issue with this same face syndrome is that we’re tired of seeing the same model with tiny changes made to it. you can only look at the same woman with slightly different features so many times before you start to ask, “is this it?” give us something new to look at, Blizzard!

now, a counter-argument i received was that you dont really look at the face much in game. my friend said, “faces, in a game where faces are barely seen, barely matter. in the cinematics they matter a lot.” while i acknowledge the truth behind the argument that you dont look at the characters’ faces much while playing, i still think that the faces do hold some significance, because otherwise all the male models would have the same faces in-game. Blizzard has taken the time to carefully create these incredibly unique models for each male character, but when it comes to creating the female characters’ models, Blizzard sort of gives up and barely changes the default model they seem to use. this isnt a matter of unimportance as it is a matter of laziness.

the best example of this is with Brigitte, who is the most recent addition to the heroes gallery. in her cinematic, she is seen as broad-shouldered with a round face, round eyes, olive or tan skin, a round chin, thick lips, green/hazel eyes and brown hair. however, when it comes to her in-game model, well… she doesnt exactly live up to that. her in-game model has reddish hair, brown eyes, a slender face, a pointed chin, light skin, almond-shaped eyes, and a thin upper lip. she almost doesnt look like the same person! you can see the differences in the image below.

(from @flambxyant​)

now, some people commented on the post that this image is from that the engines used for the cinematics and the game are different. and while i concede that these arent the same, and therefore it would be difficult to make an exact replica of the cinematic version of Brigitte in the game engine, i feel like she still falls short of what could be accomplished. if the problem was truly the difference in the engines, then you would see a similar change in the male models between the cinematic engine and the game engine. however, Blizzard seems to have no problem replicating models in both engines, except for when it come to the female models. thats the problem that people have; they arent being nit-picky, as some may argue – this is an actual issue that many people are noticing.

as seen in previous images, Brigitte has been compared to Mercy, who is a popular support character in the game (Brigitte is also a support character), as well as to D.VA and Tracer, who are not support characters (im not really sure what the categories are other than support tbh). the issue which is being presented is that many of the Overwatch women have very similar faces; even if they have some unique features, the female models in Overwatch still do not stray too far from the base model which is clearly detectable in all of them. you do not really see this as clearly in the male models, as each of them has been changed to express the character’s personality or background. it is more difficult to pick up on a character’s personality or background when looking at the female models; you can kind of gauge that Ana is older and may have been in a war because she has vaguely wrinkled skin and an eye patch, but other than that, the women of Overwatch arent exactly telling their stories unless you read their lore.

another issue i have to address is that, while all of the characters have a unique backstory, not everyone playing Overwatch is interested in that; some people just want to play the game. and when you have a heroes gallery with a plethora of unique male models to choose from, and then basically the same face on all of the female models, it feels kind of…. lacking. like, “oh wow, a new character!” but how new is the character if youre just looking at the same model with slight changes in the face and a repaint? you might as well just be getting a different skin and slapping it onto one available option.

my issue here is that having unique lore doesnt counteract the fact that the female models all look very similar to each other. when youre playing the game, youre looking at the model. sure, you get different weapons and armour, but it’s the same figure. and honestly, i kind of get the feeling that Blizzard tries to give each female model a sense of uniqueness by changing their armour or clothes instead of their model shape or size.

it just doesnt feel right when you compare it to how unique each male model is. you feel refreshed when looking at each male character because they all have a unique silhouette; theyre easily discernible from the others. however, the female models all have rather similar silhouettes: tall and slender. this isnt to completely disregard Mei and Zarya, but really, those two are essentially the only unique silhouettes out of all the of female models.

while im not disparaging the fact that Blizzard has created unique lore for each character, i still feel like having as much model diversity in the female models as is in the male models would be nice. like, i think everyone can agree that having different silhouettes in the male models is really refreshing to look at, and in turn, having different silhouettes in the female models would be just as pleasant. 

i feel as though Blizzard is apprehensive about going out of their comfort zone when creating female models. they kind of seem to default on slender, attractive faces with thin noses. this isnt to say that non-slender faces or big noses cant be attractive; i am saying that Blizzard sticks to western beauty standards when creating their female models. my friend made a counter-argument that the target audience is men, and therefore the women characters are often going to be designed to appeal to this audience. while i understand the reason why Blizzard would do this, as appealing to this audience will likely raise their profits and positive reception, i still feel like they are missing out on a lot of potential that the company has. like, let’s be real here……. if there are people who will main Junkrat and want to bone down with his nasty ass, then im pretty sure that there would be people who would enjoy a less conventionally attractive female character.

i have an issue with the fact that Blizzard wont even attempt to create a unique female model. it’s almost as if they made Zarya and Mei and were like “thats good! no more!” but yet they will make a gorilla; and a really fat guy; and a skinny, unkempt, hunched over dude. but they wont even try to accomplish anything like that when creating a female model. sure, Ana is sort of hunched over to indicate her age, but she still maintains a relatively dainty posture.

Overwatch gets praise for the diversity seen in their characters, and while my friend made a counter-argument that it might just be for national diversity – or racial diversity, or whatever you wanna call it when people come from different parts of the world –  i still feel like this diversity is lacking in the women of Overwatch. the men of Overwatch have all sorts of body types: short, tall, skinny, fat, muscled, disabilities, etc…… but the women have significantly less body types: you have Zarya, who is broad-shouldered and has muscles; you have Mei, who is plus-sized – or fat, or thicc if you prefer; you have Ana who is old and sort of shows it; you have Sombra who is slightly shorter than the rest of the characters, but not by much; you have Moira who is slightly taller than the rest of the characters, but not by much….. but generally, all of the women of Overwatch look pretty much the same. theres not much diversity seen there.

now, again, do i expect Blizzard to change the way they design female characters? no, because as my friend stated, “…their current formula is working out quite well…” i just wish that when people look at the characters in Overwatch, they could have something new to see in each and every character. it’s tiring to see pretty much the same woman with different clothes when the men of Overwatch are so distinct from each other.

and yes, while i do not play Overwatch, or any video games for that matter, that doesnt mean my argument is pointless. sure, i dont expect anything to come of it, but it’s at least food for thought, you know? and if you think about it, the lack of diversity in the female models in Overwatch doesnt do much good in showing the creative abilities of Blizzard, which is a public company and therefore trying to sell their product to an audience who very likely wants to buy something unique and impressive. thats not to say Overwatch isnt impressive – i actually find the art style to be extremely attractive, and the fact that it is such a popular game goes to show that the company is doing something right. but that doesnt mean that the game is flawless; it just means the flaws are often overlooked or just accepted by the consumers and creators.

you see, when i look at a character and see how unique and detailed their physical design is in comparison to other characters that it is associated with, i am able to tell that the person who made that character put a lot of time, care, and thought into that character in order to make it stand out as its own individual. when looking at how similar the women of Overwatch look to each other, i cant help but feel that there is a lack of time, care, and thought going into them. you can tell the creators thought a lot about each man in Overwatch, as they all look like individuals compared to one another; however, this isnt very present when looking at the women of Overwatch.

you see, you need to put care and effort into all of your characters in order for people to take your diversity seriously. if youre presenting all of the same models for the women, but really unique models for the men, sure, you have representation for women, but it kind of feels like you see women as identical and incapable of being as unique as men can be, which is just lazy and kind of sexist. and im not trying to get into a really stupidly obnoxious “this is sexist!” argument, because tbh i hate those, but like…. i just wanna see some new stuff brought to the table. something to really make you go, “wow, that character really stands out from the others!”

i dont feel like my opinion of the game – or really anyone’s opinion of the game – would change if Overwatch were to have more diverse female models, but i do think that people, no matter what their opinions of the game were, would at least be able to look at the character and be able to tell that at least the creators put thought and care into each character. while there definitely is care and thought seen in each character, i dont really see an issue with some people wishing there was just a bit more for the women of Overwatch.

anyways that basically all i have. if you made it this far, i appreciate you reading all of this. feel free to message me or something about this (on @nuketowncryptid since i dont have any messaging system set up on this blog because it’s pointless) if you wanna talk about it. anyways, thank you so much for reading what i have to say. you dont have to share this if you dont want to, and again, i really dont want to have anyone feel like im pushing my opinions on them; i just wanted to share my thoughts on the subject. overall, im just glad to see people are at least enjoying the game because in the end, thats what really counts.

[tumblunni]

MAN I tried messing around starting newgame plus on Digimon Cyber Sleuth, even though I’ve played more than enough already so I’m not really gonna play again so soon after finishing. And... WHAT THE HELL?? Seriously this is like a one game microcosm of how you don’t realise how much you’re being mistreated until you see how the other side lives. Specifically on the subject of weird minority stereotypes... The difference between the designs/animations/general presentation of the two gender options is REALLY BIZARRE?? I had no clue! Playing as the girl you just kinda think ‘yeah thats weird maybe’ but you dont realise the dude doesnt have the same problems. Like... she VERY MUCH suffers from the ‘miss male character’ trope. She’s the weird sort of ‘lol sexy genderswap deviantart fanfiction’ version of a female option. I thought I was just reading too much into it with how the girl is posed like a supporting character on the boxart and literally never appeared in any of the promotional material until the game came out... Its just so... ODD! Everything EVERYTHING about her is defined to be this overthetop stereotypical idea of ‘we have to let them know she’s the girl version’. She’s far more sexualized, she always does these ‘girly’ or ‘hot’ poses for LITERALLY EVERYTHING! Like, the dude’s animation is just running but she has to run with her arms wide out to the sides, skipping like a five year old and swaying her hips. And her standing pose also has the hands out, her toes inturned, her chest thrust forwards and this general sort of ‘tee hee hee’ thing?? It really REALLY started to bug me how her chest is ALWAYS thrust forwards, I started to get super anxious about ‘holy shit am I ever doing that when I walk and i dont know it? is this really how female bodies are supposed to work??’. Its like her resting pose is this thing and its extremely painful for her to fold her joints back into a normal mode. And she’s always always posing when the dude isnt posing AT ALL, even her selection screen image is her doing the ‘one leg bounces back while you kiss someone’ type pose, contorted into a wild accordion while he’s just looking at the camera. I jsut... didnt even realise what was bothering me so much about playing as this character, til i saw the total absence of it on the dude... SERIOUSLY! He doesnt have some overstereotypical super huge macho animation set, his design isnt made to yell ‘I’M MALE’, he isnt sexualized, he isnt the ‘one body type everyone in this gender has to have’. He’s a scrawny androgenous waif that could have worked equally well if you slapped the label female on that design, somehow to make him female they decided they had to scoop out holes in his waist and hips and shove them on his chest. While also adding a bazillion extra animations that make her walk around everywhere like that one damn gif of terrible ragdoll physics as some guy walks down a road. I did not understand that whole assassins creed controversy about ‘but women need more animations, it’d be too much work to add them’. NOW I UNDERSTAND. Why on EARTH do they think they need these animations?? Women dont have to do everything differently to men to prove theyre women, in real life literally nobody worries about accentuating stereotypical gender roles while doing COMPLETELY NORMAL THINGS. Women dont put huge effort into looking cute or sexy while they’re just frickin walking down the street or standing alone in the privacy of their own home. Its like these people know so little about women outside of hollywood femme fatale movies that they legit think that sort of walk cycle is biologically ingrained into one gender???? The fact nobody ever acts like macho bodybuilder walk cycles should be given to normal tiny teenagers in every situation makes it pretty clear the difference here... And seriously, what is even this universal THING that ‘male are default, you need to mark a character as different to show she’s female’? Which usually means making her more feminine than the real female actor playing her, like that even makes a damn lick of sense :P I mean seriously if we’re gonna talk actual biology, men are the ‘different’. A species cannot exist with only men, the only one sex species are all female. Or lack a sex, or contain both sets of genitals. Also there is at least one bird species that has two male genders as well as female. And male seahorses get pregnant, and male clownfish can physically transition into females as part of their natural life cycle. And all sorts of far more diverse things we humans can barely understand! And like... you can say ‘women are the different and men are the blank, because women have boobs and men don’t’. But you can also say that women are the default because men are the same thing with penises added. And seriously, boobs are just nipples that actually serve their intended purpose. Women have this extra function compared to men because MALE BREASTS ARE VESTIGAL! The organ still exists, it just sits there doing nothing and never changes at puberty. (Though even that is more fluid that you’d expect, there are ways to induce lactation even if you’re a cis man. i dont really know why anyone would want to do that, it wouldnt exactly work as well, but whatever.) Aaaaand OF COURSE this entire thing is a stupid argument anyway because it only talks about biology, which is not the same thing as gender. Not to mention that biological sex isn’t all cut and dry either, the human species has A LOT of different intersex conditions. You can even have people who don’t have significant enough outward symptoms to be recognised as intersex at birth, who go their whole life thinking they’re a cis male only to suddenly find out they had an undiagnosed hormone condition and are technically a trans man. There is most definately no magical biological guideline for how men and women act. Especially frickin stupid nonsense like overspecific cultural guidelines on what’s cute for a woman to do while running, geez. You really can;t just ‘tell’ that someone is ‘really a woman’ or ‘really a man’ cos of how they act, and thats why this stuff pisses me off even when the story isnt saying anything about trans people. I’m so used to seeing this overexaggerated japanese concept of feminine/masculine mannerisms being used on trans stereotypes, it bugs me even seeing it being done to cis women... gahh this has gone wildly offtopic and I’m just venting Everything Bad About Stereotypes rather than the specific thing about this specific game I need to logoff and go cheer myself up. OH BUT yeah this game also literally has a friggin ‘we can tell this man is really a woman because mannerisms’ scene :P which also dissappointed the hell out of me cos it seemed like a trans character and instead it was the cliche I Had Some Reason To Pretend To Be A Man thing... Also apparantly instead of acting like that male persona, the male persona was magical brainwashing virtual reality stuff. What a wasted opportunity! You could have told us a lot of stuff about her personality from comparing how she acted while under this other fake personality, and what it implies she hides from other people. Like ‘hey, maybe she actually can be confident as long as she’s wearing a mask!’ Nah, everything badass or tough or sassy she did was just mind control. And she’s not trans. And blehh being outed by ‘acting like a girl’... Its so weird cos the game actually does have one trans npc in a sidequest, and has trans themes with a few major digimon. In the sense that they were male in previous seasons and have designs considered ‘masculine’ but take female forms when disguising themselves as humans. (and the player-controlled versions of these digivolutions even have different masculine voices matching earlier seasons!) Gahhhh at least I can sit here hugging my ambiguously genderqueer alphamon headcanons and nobody can tell me those arent canon cos the question was never answered either way! I hate the cliche answer that ‘yes all alphamons are male cos they ‘look male’, this one was just a man disguised as a woman’, but still even if that was the intent, it means the character is trans coded! EITHER OPTION IS TRANS TIME protect me, alphamon protect me from super gender essentialist game how do you even EXIST in this game?? seriously even your human disguise was super fanservicey weird female stereotypes mannnnnn i guess I had a few problems with this game aside from the one stupid rape scene :P aaaaand the problem of the game clearly being written assuming nobody would play the female option, so characters still constantly call you ‘he’ and such the only good consolation being that the game accidentally becomes Hella Gay, though I would have preferred canon lesbians instead of this weirdness WHY CANT FEI AND YUUKO BE CANON IT GOT SO CLOSE TO BEING CANON THEN FEI DISSAPPEARED FROM THE PLOT FOREVER only reappearing as a postgame newgame plus bonus boss that makes it impossible to complete the damn Masters Cup damn you fei damn you awesome amazing hella gay fei whom i love you deserved to be in a better game you deserved to be the matt-esque rival, i will never forget that you started off teasing that role and then just vanished... HELL, CAN SHE BE THE PROTAGONIST OF A SEQUEL OR SOMETHING game entirely about her and yuuko’s amazing story of love! also alphamon wandering in just to yell ‘I AM CANONICALLY TRANSGENDER’, make everyone a cup of coffee, and leave aaaaa why did i spend so long rambling every single complaint about this game, games in general, gender stereotypes in gender, life in general... its weird how just realizing ONE THING about a stupid walk cycle animation made me realise my general nebulous feeling of uncomfortableness that I could never explain about this game :P I am really excited for digimon world next order being better than this!