Since "minor" encompasses any and all ages up to 18, it's important to be clear that I'm not accusing anyone of pedophilia, here or otherwise. I'm not really making any moral judgments at all. What I am saying is given that general anime media includes so few 18-year-olds or older, especially when it comes to moe designs, clearly that's not where the money is. And there hasn't been any sort of push from the overall fanbase to change that. So, I'm concluding that there wouldn't be a constant need to make these characters 18, 18, 18, 18 (which looks stupid) without that fear of getting the banhammer abroad. And that's the main reason why TN keeps going with 18, even if it looks stupid, and even if the character design they made would cause some doubt.
I'll take back "prefer" and bring back "wouldn't care if" if that works better.
These have been some really busy days, so I'm sorry for the late response.
I'm glad to know you weren't accusing anyone since it's something really common lately, so I'm sorry if I sound too categorical.
As I said, if they feared to been banned and people calling these characters minors, then they would opt for more ages above 18. I mean, yes, Dimensions happened and Marie Age birthday (not only her age) is a literal "fuck you" to them but that's what I see with every other of these girls, they being controversial at porpose. Being controversial have been a marketing tool for them sometimes.
Because they generally do. We've studied enough about human physiology at this point as a world to know what's common and what's not. For example, the average height of a Swedish woman is 5'5"/167cm. Marie is well below that at 4'9"/147cm. An outlier. Even the people whom this applies to in real life know they are outliers. She is not the first thing you'd design when trying to depict a Swede. You have to intentionally go for that outlier, or be basing it on a specific person who is that outlier.
So, you designed someone not just super short, but also very young in the face, and whom acts like a young child in personality and mannerisms, but then say that they're of majority age. People might doubt it, but okay. It does happen sometimes in real life. But, if you keep doing that over and over, you're unintentionally (or intentionally) saying that this is the norm when it's not. (Or maybe you're saying that it's the ideal, which I don't think works overall.) If you were to run into these people in real life over and over in quick succession, you would think it was slightly weird. So, lo and behold, when TN keeps introducing these unconnected people from differing countries, but all outliers in the same way, one after the other, people think it's weird. It would draw attention even if it were a different attribute that doesn't feed into the whole "Is it okay to sexualize them?" dilemma. If TN had the next 3 characters all be redheads, people would also think it was odd. And, the next step for people would be to wonder why they did it.
The thing is, I don't think they wanted to design the average Swede, like when they design Japanese girls they don't even try to design the average Japanese woman due, you know, their body sizes.
Also, the "when you do it over and over" is just Marie Rose and NiCO and only in body structure, not even in personality. Honoka and all these other Xtreme girls are just in another whole league where you have to use terms like "oppai loli" to try really hard to incluse they as lolis/minors.
That's the thing. TN has full control over how Marie comes off to others. They could've given her a more "self-aware" type personality. Like, she's playing up the kid angle as a great deception. But, when it came time to flesh her out and give her some story time...yeah, she pretty much just is the kid, tantrums and all. They choked. They can't choke. lol
Mmmmmmm, I doubt it. It's not that she's "different". I'd say her popularity is because she's a kawaii, blonde, twin-tailed goth loli. She comes right from that modern moe aesthetic. Something that Honoka and NiCO were also designed to fit into. Marie is...Marie, Honoka is a ditzy airhead, and NiCO is a chunibyo (a flavor of immaturity). The moe aesthetic is 95% of the time a child-like cuteness, immaturity, or helplessness meant to evoke a protector mentality in the audience. Coming off as super-mature and adult goes against that feeling. Ergo, moe characters usually aren't adults.
So, in agreeing with, or choosing to give in to, those fans who think that Marie, Honoka, and NiCO need that special protection during a Break Blow, they're further infantilizing them. Which is extra awkward given their physical designs and controversial age. I'm saying they shouldn't feed into it, lest the discourse surrounding them and possible bans start to worsen, actual 18 age be damned. The controversy isn't going to help after a certain point. Apparently, the mods on the DOA Reddit are already starting to look over their shoulders.
Even if you say her popularity is just because she's a "blonde gothic lokita", that's not enough reason to being that much popular in this franchise, that was known for her busty female characters. Old fans would expect something totally different. The "moe" fans that you are saying wouldn't just start buying this franchise because there was just one single character that they can like.
Honoka personality in other hand is pretty much the same as Mila with super powers because the obvious reason (being related to that man) and NiCO personality is not even close to being Chūnibyō since she doesn't have anything special (her power is not even a challenge to the Gary Stues and Mary Sues) and her purpose is not that great, it's more mundane than any other rival (even if you can call her that) in the franchise. Diego would fit that archetype much more (age aside), since he's "the best" just because yes, deux ex machina included but you know, people won't question him because he is a man and he is the typical western """"serious"""" archetype.
About break blows, Japanese fans don't ask for them being censored just because they think they are minors, they complained about these characters looking "fainted" in their facial expresions, like American players saying to Shimbori they felt "embarrased" playing with the classic female costumes and being that the reason why these costumes are now just alternative costumes.
Team Ninja (or Koei) listeing to both the most radical sides has nothing to do with characters being minors, it's them ... just wanting money desperately. In my opinion they should just give the middle finger to both sides and just go in the direction they want.
