I have said all I wish to or will say on the subject. Carry on.
Hey, you mind me asking you a question? It's completely fine if you don't, given that you have said all that you wanted on the subject but I'm just curious.
Do you feel Shenmue so far did have bad representation of the fairer sex? Personally I feel there's a good range in Shenmue. I mean the women are all different from each other. The only one that might possibly be a danger so far is Joy, but it's not impossible to imagine the daughter of a well to do business empire get involved with the wrong crowd. Everything about her, from her scant clothing to her over the top dyed hair, screams a desire to make an impression. I also think that some women are like that, not every one of course, but some may be. Teenagers especially can be.
What are your thoughts on Shenmue's depiction of women so far? (It's hard to talk about this new ChiYouMen leader since we haven't really seen her yet properly) But only if you don't mind me asking, of course.
Also, every time I see your avatar I want to play Skies of Arcadia again.
I don't personally mind the depiction at all. But then, I'm male, and not really the one who would be impacted by the depiction. Even among women, not everyone will mind it either. But for those who do, I advocate their right to voice concerns about it - just as I advocate Yu's right to depict his characters however he wants - I actually feel Shenmue has some decent to good depictions of women personally. But I think a lot of women would like to see characteristics other than simply "strong and beautiful" in video games.
Someone (can't remember who) once said something (poorly paraphrasing from memory) along the lines of, "Batman gets to be strong, handsome, scarred, dark, conflicted, a brilliant detective, intelligent, haunted, and arguably psychotic. But somehow just being 'strong' is considered enough when it comes to most female characters." I may not personally feel that way about Shenmue or other games, but I can totally understand some women feeling that way.
The reason I don't want to talk about it further though, is because I've been through it many times and been called a "white knight" or a "social justice warrior" for my trouble. So while that may or may not happen here, I just don't have the emotional or mental energy to engage with the topic and really discuss it frankly. Online debates never result in anyone changing their views anyway (not that I want to change anyone's views) and it's such a controversial issue that my social anxiety and depression don't really allow me to brave the storm of discussion for long before I feel overwhelmed and sad, so I just don't usually.
So with that said, I will bow out of the discussion again.
P.S. I play SOA at least once every couple of years on Gamecube. :) Wish they'd release it again, in any form.
Oh, I ain't going to call you a SJW or anything like that. If you feel compassionate about how it may affect others there's nothing wrong with that. I don't see you throwing abuse or anything. Wasn't Elaine, (can't quite remember the spelling of that name) the tai chi expert in Shenmue 2, a fairly good portrayal of a 'normal' woman?
Come to think of it, there was actually a fair lot of NPCs which also seemed 'fairly adjusted/unsensationally designed'... I suppose. :) Never really thought about it... :-k Yeah I agree with you. I think Shenmue's pretty good with that kind of thing.
In regards to SoA: I remember the game actually having a feasible difficulty level as well. Like it was a fair challenge, although the dungeon grinding was on another level. God, I remember looking for that earth dungeon after the tribal village. It took me so long to find the two markers. One I found straight away but the other... man I was just sailing around for about 5 hours of world map grinding to find it. I thought ship battles and the sense of freedom were excellent in Skies. I loved the VMU stuff as well. So good. God I want to play it now.
But please do not fall in the trap of a headline crying sexist / misogynistic game when in context for Shenmue, these are adamantly untrue. They have not been sexist in the past and I don't doubt Suzuki will remain consistent with his portrayal of women for the future.
I think Anonymous81 is okay with Shenmue's depiction of women for the most part. I don't think you have to be concerned.