I don't remember there being any dude eye candy.
I don't remember there being any dude eye candy.
Frazetta_sungoddess.jpgOriginally Posted by Serenegoose
I disagree.
I don't think you can really use Frazetta to form the basis of an argument 30 years after his work was truly popular.
Where does popularity come in? I'm using him to demonstrate that wearing nothing does not have to look tired, unimaginative, cheap, tedious, and dismissive.
I guess I could hunt out a very recent piece of art that shows that, if you really insist. Or I could just go way back and get some greek warrior-women sculptures or pictures of lady liberty or something.
Frazetta was popular in the '80s, back when the whole unclothed fantasy movement was big. Loincloths, bras, thongs, yadda yadda. He took almost a classical view to fantasy work, and it worked... then. It's almost like he did Greek sculptures with a fantasy bent, but it tended to be less natural and more sexually charged, I'd say. He exaggerated more, he increased features, so on and so forth.
Now is not then (When will then be now?, etc), and I'd like to think we've moved on from Frazetta and his contemporaries. Conan isn't as popular as he was, and even in the recent remake with Jason Momoa, he was wearing more than Arnie did in Red Sonja, Conan the Barbarian and Conan the Destroyer, or was at least wearing more practical things.
Isabela is wearing more than most things Frazetta painted, but she's little different. She's exaggerated, she's got a sexual element, and whereas Frazetta drew art (that was, at the time, brilliant but also relevant), she comes across as nothing more than eye candy. Her clothes are so close to being sensible that it feels stupid that BioWare didn't finish the job. It's like Miranda in ME2. If they'd removed the camel toe, fixed a few things here and there, she could have a very sensible set of clothes that make sense in context. But neither Isabela nor Miranda make sense. Why? Because they're walking around with this unnecessary sexual element to them.
Isabela's clothes offer no protection at all in a close-combat setting, and her tits would be flying all over the place, and would also likely be constantly flashing her *cough* at people.
Compare Merrill and Aveline's outfits to Isabela (and also Bethany). Compare Hawke, Cassandra and a few others to Isabela. Do you not see how ridiculous she looks?
I was responding to Serenegoose's post as a general statement rather than trying to defend Dragon Age 2 - I haven't played it.
From the pictures I've seen, every character seems to leave bits of bare skin unarmoured over important organs. Merrill has decided to wear armour everywhere but over her arms, legs and heart, while Hawke apparently plans to only be hit in his right arm. Isabella actually seems better because she's just wearing cloth, instead of putting heavy plate armour over some bits and then leaving massive gaps everywhere for no reason.
I do agree that I'd like to see more down-to-earth, believable costuming in games generally.
Last edited by JackShandy; 09-04-2012 at 09:40 AM.
Yes. Demonic possession; so technically he'd be undead.
Or she could be wearing some form of bra. They've only been around since the Babylonians after all. Also worth remembering she's drawn from the classical Caribbean pirates, who tended to wear very little on account of spending most of their lives standing on the open deck of a ship in temperatures that regularly topped 40C (although sailors in general tended to wear simple loose fitting garments even in arctic climes on account of needing to scramble up and down ropes on a regular basis).
Aveline is the only one who wears anything that would be protective in combat. Which is sensible, since nobody is going to arrest the guard captain on a charge of "going equipped". Merril and Bethany are both mages and wear robes, as is traditional (at least they avoid the silly headgear this time). If you want to avoid comparing apples to oranges, I'd suggest Varric would have been a better comparison given he's also a rogue. Although I think Isabella actually comes off on top in that comparison (personally I suspect she grabbed the last pirate outfit from the fancy dress shop, leaving poor Varric with no option but the 70s disco fever garb).Compare Merrill and Aveline's outfits to Isabela (and also Bethany). Compare Hawke, Cassandra and a few others to Isabela. Do you not see how ridiculous she looks?
Miranda is perhaps the only case where the overt sexualization actually made sense. She was a cold-hearted professional who wasn't above using any means to get what she wanted, and those included using her sexuality to her advantage.
Armour is always a trade off between protection Vs manoeuvrability. A lightly armoured combatant is reliant on speed and agility to keep them alive through evasion until opportunity to strike arises Vs a heavily armoured combatant whom is reliant on bodily protection and sheer force to defeat opponents.
Like for like tends to work well, but when the two meet, generally unless it's a very confined space and fatigue and skill isn't a factor there's only one likely outcome: -
Why yes you're right I'm deliciously evil
Tradition is the tyranny of dead men
Steam:Kadayi Origin: Kadayi GFWL: Kadayi
Probable Replicant
*blush* I'm flattered by the attention boys, but please let's not make the thread about liddle old me
Merrill and Bethany both have chainmail on, a lot in Merrill's case (whereas Bethany's only protects her stomach and back, and it doesn't seem to do a particularly good job of that). But yes, Isabela could be wearing a bra, but her tits would be all over the place in that clothing. Sports bras are designed specifically for high levels of activity, and they are completely different to your standard t-shirt/push-up bra. Isabela's back would be absolutely fudged if she existed and did what she does. Absolutely fudged.
As for Varric; he's not exactly a close-combat type, is he? He sits at the back with Bianca and picks enemies off. He can viably get away with wearing what he does, because he needs less protection. If he got into close combat, however, it would be a bit ridiculous.
Using one's sexuality to one's advantage does not generally mean wearing what is little more than opaque clingfilm.
@Althea Yea, but giving her shitty outfit was the easiest way of portraying what she was about.
And that is why I absolutely do not respect BioWare's writers nor their visual designers.
Don't get me started. Still, Miranda is perhaps the only character, who isn't from BG, that I liked in a Bioware game.
And, what's up with your changing avatars, you draw them yourself?
Not even Mordin?
They've done some good characters, but largely they're not that interesting.
Skill icons from Dungeons of Dredmor.
In this thread we talk about the outfits of companions in a video game.
People defending Isabella's clothing? There I was thinking people defending the story and gameplay would be the most incomprehensible thing I'd find in this thread.
Yeah, it kind of got away from us here.
I actually looked into it, and apparently there are a variety of hand-waves that they could use, going so far as to have had Anders dress up a corpse to fake his own death after the battle. It certainly raises the question of why they went to such extremes rather than just write a new character, especially since they were so hellbent on making Anders suffer to the point of being dramatically different.
Reading some of this has not made me want to get DA2 - I was thinking about it; I'm no RPG hardnose.
All it's done is made me want to play Alpha Protocol a second time. For all of the "DA2 is good, even though it's not a 'proper' RPG" talk I can;t help but feel that most recently Alpha Protocol nailed the "not a proper RPG" genre...
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
