Compromises to racial identity to make females "prettier"

[rogueMatthias]

For all those that don't remember, the Vanilla female troll model looks like this -



One of my biggest criticisms against Blizzard's design team is its designs for female characters. Their need to "prettify" all the female races always causes them to make massive compromises on the theme and look of the race. As a few examples -

Trolls - We're used to seeing it now, but the female model has always inexplicably stood upright with tusks so small they were barely worth the effort. IMO There was far too much compromise from the vanilla look to make them prettier and they've always looked more Zandalari than Darkspear.



Dwarves - Females actually can have beards too in lore but I don't think Blizzard would ever implement that. For the wildhammer tribe especially, a woman with a large beard is seen a great beauty.

Vulpera - The females have thin waists and boobs. Because they're foxes so why not have boobs? I kinda feel it wasn't needed and they could do enough in the expression and faces or model sizes to split apart the genders without giving them boobs. At least they're not compromising the race theme of these though.

Worgen - In trying NOT to make the women look like ferocious angry werewolves (you know... the whole point of the race) we ended up with skinny, slim-waisted wolf women with super weird faces... and boobs. Because why not have werewolves with boobs?

One of these is a ferocious werewolf. The other is a slim hairy woman with a bad Halloween mask -



Kul Tiran - The males are beefy and burly and look like they've seen a few fights. They once again wouldn't commit to this for the females and meet half way so we have normal humans but larger. The look super dull and don't have any of the personality and character that the men do.

Say what you will about them, but the men look like gorilla-esque bruisers at least. The women though are so dull they look like they could be working in the HR department with a dolphin handpuppet.




It's one of my biggest fears for an Ogre race to be honest. The females are meant to be almost indistinguishable from the females. We're inevitably going to get some skinnier, smaller, prettier, less-threatening version for women with tiny tusks and pigtails. (and boobs obviously)

They'll probably end up more like this fan art -



For all the complaints about Kul Tirans being "FAT" I think this is the bigger issues - That Blizzard are so scared to break free from their norms that they won't allow the women to look like hardened bruisers like the men. The women imo look generic and plain and boring, and have had all of the Kul Tiran personality drained from them in compromise to make them prettier and more non-threatening.

[rda]

I am not sure of your point - are you advocating for troll females to be like that ugliness on the first screen? Because that's "authentic"???

[Lodreh]

... The women though are so dull they look like they could be working in the HR department with a dolphin handpuppet...

Lol, love the Archer reference. I agree... I want the women to have more muscle definition in the arms and legs. Give me a surly barmaid not a soccer mom with glandular issues.

[Deleted]

Two words.

Sex sells.

[TheImperios]

As much as people complain about pandering to progressives, pandering to the patriarchy is a much greater concern. People often criticised GW2 for its "SJW" storyline, but if there's one thing they did right, it's the charr females.

[Mic_128]

It's one of my biggest fears for an Ogre race to be honest. The females are meant to be almost indistinguishable from the females. We're inevitably going to get some skinnier, smaller, prettier, less-threatening version for women with tiny tusks and pigtails. (and boobs obviously)

Hopefully if they are added, they're more along the lines of the one drawn in the second Warcraft: Travellers novel.

[Fumu]

I would love an art direction more like how GW2 handled females, but that's just not WoW's style. At least there are enough girls done right (Orcs, humans) that you can avoid the ones that look like they're from an entirely different species.

Also sometimes, their female redesign works. Weren't female Taurens originally gross-looking too? The final version had less polish than the men but was still a recognizably female Tauren, who looked strong and powerful and not like a creepy sex doll with a cow's head pasted on.

[Speaknoevil]

All you accomplished here was desperately make me want Oni.

[Mirishka]

Its almost like people forget these are Blizzard's characters... which means the 'racial identity' is whatever Blizz decides it is. Don't get me wrong - I'd prefer savage, vicious evil-looking worgen as well, but ultimately they are Blizzard's creation and can look however Blizz damn well pleases.

Having said that Blizz has openly admitted to screwing up on female worgen and the BFA remodel will likely address that to some extent.

Last but not least... there's not a chance in hell that terribad fan-art informs the design of female ogres. Not a chance.

[Video Games]

I prefer cute girls, what a shocker. Or do you think it's weird not many female overwatch players play zarya or whatever her name is compared to mercy or dva?

[Goretex]

Well female characters are suppose to attract female players, usually. Females usually go for characters with boobs or that look somewhat feminine.

[Nihilan]

Theres more player interest (and money) to be had with attractive/cutesy female characters than there is with ugly/monstrous female characters.

>how do i business?
>wat do?
>help pls

[ro9ue]

I agree OP this is a long time criticism I've had of Blizzard as well. I always bring up EverQuest which in my view did it correctly:




Blizzard doesn't really know how to design different girls. It's kind of sad. Even look at Overwatch, all of their faces are pretty much identical just change hair, eye and skin color. Moira was the first one where she actually felt different from the others.

[Justpassing]

Men like pretty women
Women like pretty women

It's business.

[Mic_128]

Also sometimes, their female redesign works. Weren't female Taurens originally gross-looking too?

Oh dear god! I went looking and wish I hadn't.

[Aeula]

I think Blizzard just want people to play their races.

Do you think anyone would play a troll female if they looked like that? Some might but the troll race representation would be greatly diminished.

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

Men like pretty women
Women like pretty women

It's business.

Speak for yourself.

[Queen of Hamsters]

The female Worgen look as they do BECAUSE people screeched that the first pass was "too pretty".

And whilst I'm all for having very few differences between the sexes, akin to Charr in GW2 where it makes sense, I like characters that look good. What looks good however, comes down to the theme of a race.

The female Kul'tiran doesn't look good, she looks flat and generic. She needs to look like a bruiser that hunts sea monsters, same as the males.

[Nihilan]

And the 9 people who play female worgens are happy with the outcome im sure.

[The Stormbringer]

Speak for yourself.

I mean, they're not wrong. The majority tends to prefer things that are attractive. Why do you think transmog is such a huge hit in WoW, or glamour in FFXIV? People like to look good with their virtual avatars.

- - - Updated - - -

The female Worgen look as they do BECAUSE people screeched that the first pass was "too pretty".

Yeah, and those people are the same, desperate trolls who screeched about Pandaren and are now screeching about Vulpera.