Bikini Armor Battle Damage

adobsonartworks:

In MGSV if you ogle Quiet, she “poses” for you suggestively. In Death Stranding if you stare at Sam’s crotch, he punches you. The framing of both of these are bad. One is framed as a reward, the other is framed as “no homo!” despite the player’s action in both being the same. I don’t care if you worship Kojima, we REALLY need to talk about the “male gaze” perspective in his games, and stop giving him a pass because you love his games.

On the one hand, I do appreciate that ogling a character who isn’t comfortable with it comes with consequences. On the other hand, I doubt there are consequences for ogling any of the ladies. I also agree with the “no-homo” and violence criticism. Are guys not allowed to say “hey, could you stop staring at my crotch? It’s making me uncomfortable”? Wincenworks, please confirm.

This really points out the big double standard in the last 2 games from Kojima, as well as most of the media we criticize on this blog: that men have agency and women are just objects meant for consumption, whether that’s for fan-service, being a plot device, or being a lamp. The two lady characters I know from the reveals from Death Stranding are named Mother and Fragile, so that’s…. not promising at all.

-Icy

Punching people in the face for looking at their crotch is generally frowned upon in society, as it is usually customary for the other party to demand you be removed from premises or charged, even in places which still have “gay panic” defenses on the books. (What I’m saying is this normalizes the absurd justifications cishet men use for real violence against real men-loving-men)

I’d also like to point out that while Kojima apologists are quick to blame Konami for everything from Quiet to climate change, the last time Kojima had near total creative control was Policenauts (where he famously even controlled the music queues via scripting rather than directions).

Policenauts is a game where nearly every female character’s breasts are an interactable item and the first appearance of Meryl from the Metal Gear Solid series, specifically so he could include a mini-game where she invites with her boobs if you score high enough at target practice.

Oh well, at least we’ll always have this helicopter ride.

- wincenworks

bikiniarmorbattledamage:

feministgamingmatters:
Somebody used this gif to “prove” that Metal Gear sexualises men the same as women:
Originally posted by bretter--than-you
Do people really think this is equivalent to Quiet (et al.) or are they being disingenuous?
I find it hilarious how dudes will insist that if people really knew about Metal Gear Solid they’d know about Raiden and that he was (allegedly) as objectified as Quiet… despite the fact Raiden and his butt run (very late in the game) were both surprises to the player (and the development team) and Quiet was used heavily as marketing material a year in advance of MGS V being released.
That and well, I could only find one figure of Raiden breathing through his skin:
It’s almost like he wasn’t intended to titillate or something.
- wincenworks
#nakedness doesn’t equal sexualisation
Continuing the theme of false equivalence… yes, we have seen (and commented on) people who proudly claim that Raiden’s naked run justifies Quiet’s “breathing through skin” un-costume.
We’re also familiar with the general confusion between sexualization and nudity. Vast majority of the Status Quo Warriors conflate bare skin with being sexual, so by that logic, Conan/Kratos/Zangief are equally, if not more sexualized than their scantily-clad female peers and therefore sexism is “solved”.
This, of course, willfully ignores the simple fact that not only so much more goes into sexualization than nudity (like framing, posing, expressions etc.) or that there are different ‘decency’ standards for bodies of different sexes (especially nipples), but also how bare skin itself doesn’t yet guarantee sexyness.
That’s why @partsal‘s female barbarian comparison is still a perfect example of how completely different character premise can be conveyed with the same amount of bare body:
~Ozzie

After long weeks of fighting Tumblr’s amazingly absurd flagging and appeal system, this post finally became visible again, so we can bring it up.

YES, DESPITE ALL ODDS, PEOPLE STILL UNIRONICALLY ARGUE THAT NEKKID RAIDEN IS AS SEXUALIZED AS QUIET IS. (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻

So here’s our brief reminder about the (not really) subtle difference between nudity and objectification.

~Ozzie

(via bikiniarmorbattledamage)

muslimgamer:

nutellarella:
happy friday everyone! quiet is absolutely shredded!. @briknerd
EDIT: original post cancelled because I actually got some really good advice on how to redesign Quiet, because although I really do like character design and want to redesign characters that people feel uncomfortable by, I have literally never played metal gear solid and know nothing about its vibe. So, here’s a re-redesign! (credit to @eruhamster for a lot of good suggestions)
@bikiniarmorbattledamage I don’t recall if you ever reblog this but I thought y’all might be interested.

Yes, I love me some practical Quiet redesigns! I especially love this because her design actually looks cool now, and would lend itself well to action and promotional shots. The separate parts are all straightforward, but the overall look comes together well and is actually interesting. I even like the off-color shoes because it makes me think that she just dug through her closet for some sandals she can wear. She finally looks like she found out she was going to the desert and then got prepared for that. She could wear a sports bra that covered the boobs entirely, but a lot of sports bras do show cleavage, so I’m fine with it.

Check out the artist’s blog for more sweet redesigns, and other art!

-Icy

(via muslimgamer)

thawingchicken:

devon-aoki:
@bikiniarmorbattledamage

The Big Quiet Boss by AnubisDHL

I thought we featured this Quiet-fied Snake before, but it’s actually an amazing 3D artwork inspired by ZombieSandwich’s illustration!

Let’s admire how the lovingly painted Snake/Big Boss body turned into a lovingly 3D-rendered one:

Please show appreciation for both the artists!

~Ozzie

kevinwada:

Naked Snake/Big Boss
Flame Con 2017 commission

Naked Snake doesn’t need breathing through his skin to show off his assets! He just follows the call of his name ;) Such an amazing illustration!

And again, this being a fanart commission done for an LGBTQ+ convention, we’re being proven that a lot of unironically empowered male artwork (Look at that boobs and butt pose! And the sultry expression!) is usually done for and by men interested in men.

~Ozzie

lesnienka:

libfas:
wyefox:
the-realest-asami:
TACTICAL BUTTCHEEKS.
There’s a reason euroforces wear the crotch plates
@lesnienka
The main weapon of the whole Belgian armed forces. Also why Dutch wear skinny jeans. Tested and proved.

The most amazing thing about this tweet is not the tactical buttcheeks - but rather the plethora of guys who rushed in to tell @artsywindow he’s wrong by tweeting pics of popular male video game characters with tactical buttcheeks.

Characters if we use the term as loosely as possible, since it’s really only two characters and one is a clone of the other and they mostly only posted pictures of the clone.

Okay they mostly only posted these two pictures (from the same game)

Clearly there is one thing that video games desperately does need to learn from Hideo Kojima - and it’s how to dress male characters (just please don’t listen to any of his ideas for how to dress female characters).

- wincenworks

(Source: otherwindow, via mrazovito-deactivated20180609)

bikiniarmorbattledamage:

sursumursa:
Let’s talk about Quiet, and attempt to answer the question:
Can you slut-shame a fictional character?
And in case anyone reading our blog still doubts whether or not Quiet (or any other woman in fiction) can be slut-shamed for her choice of attire or behavior, here’s Sursum Ursa’s concise video explanation.
Spoilers: the answer is no.
~Ozzie
As a side note, since we’re on the topic of Quiet and sexualzing characters, I feel this is an appropriate point to touch on something related:
If your argument is the men are sexualized too, but you have to comb through all the individual games to try to get together enough material to try (unsucessfully I might add) to match how much Quiet is sexualized in ONE game - you’re not going to be very convincing.
There is a massive difference between depicting a character who is many different things throughout their arc (tough, vulnerable, protected, naked, etc) and happens to be sexy at some points and creating a character who is primarily and overwhelmingly sexy all throughout their arc and happens to get to be some other things during it.
One is creating a character who’s like a person so the audience can relate to them, the other is creating a sex object and calling them a character.
It’s kind of important.
- wincenworks
more about character agency on BABD

A whole year passed since we reblogged this video, yet people still completely unironically keep telling us that:

a fictional character totally can personally choose what she wears just like a real person would (so criticizing her is supposedly no different from slut shaming)
Kojima decided to design Quiet like that for some other, smarter purpose than just popping boners and fueling cheap controversy.

So yeah, bringing back this comprehensive debunk video is definitely in order.

~Ozzie

(via bikiniarmorbattledamage)

feministgamingmatters:

Somebody used this gif to “prove” that Metal Gear sexualises men the same as women:
Originally posted by bretter--than-you
Do people really think this is equivalent to Quiet (et al.) or are they being disingenuous?

I find it hilarious how dudes will insist that if people really knew about Metal Gear Solid they’d know about Raiden and that he was (allegedly) as objectified as Quiet… despite the fact Raiden and his butt run (very late in the game) were both surprises to the player (and the development team) and Quiet was used heavily as marketing material a year in advance of MGS V being released.

That and well, I could only find one figure of Raiden breathing through his skin:

It’s almost like he wasn’t intended to titillate or something.

- wincenworks

#nakedness doesn’t equal sexualisation

Continuing the theme of false equivalence… yes, we have seen (and commented on) people who proudly claim that Raiden’s naked run justifies Quiet’s “breathing through skin” un-costume.

We’re also familiar with the general confusion between sexualization and nudity. Vast majority of the Status Quo Warriors conflate bare skin with being sexual, so by that logic, Conan/Kratos/Zangief are equally, if not more sexualized than their scantily-clad female peers and therefore sexism is “solved”.

This, of course, willfully ignores the simple fact that not only so much more goes into sexualization than nudity (like framing, posing, expressions etc.) or that there are different ‘decency’ standards for bodies of different sexes (especially nipples), but also how bare skin itself doesn’t yet guarantee sexyness.

That’s why @partsal‘s female barbarian comparison is still a perfect example of how completely different character premise can be conveyed with the same amount of bare body:

~Ozzie

(via feministgamingmatters)

Okay, so remember when Metal Gear Solid Online looked like it might actually be a precious diamond of equality in a sea of ridiculous exploitative attire? Well, now they’ve added the “naked” skin for multi-player and… yeah, for some reason they felt that female soldiers going “topless” would have an underboob shirt on.

Guy still look, well just like Snake did:

I guess we can safely assume that nobody involved in this understand how boobs work or took note from @shattered-earth‘s handy redesign.

- wincenworks

@pyrokitsune777 submitted:

Because of course they did.

Just when you thought it was safe to breathe through your skin again.

While this statue does give me the urge to wax on about the craftsmanship and attention to detail as an attempt to compensate for the overall tackiness - I feel there’s one detail in particular that’s worth highlighting:

“Anti-toxin bio-chem garment”?

Oh sure, now Quiet’s weird fetish glove on her left arm makes total sense! Somehow… to someone.

- wincenworks

(Source: kotaku.com)

Bikini Armor Battle Damage

TACTICAL BUTTCHEEKS.

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