Shimbori explains why they changed break blows on Marie, Honoka and NiCO

[candynarwhal]

Don't you all remember the controversy that got whipped up around the release of Dimensions, when there were allegations of a hentai artist, in Sweden, drawing what Swedish law could have constituted as child pornography - and then some clever fuckhead decided to bring up DOA in order to challenge the claim, and even went so far as to approach Nintendo directly, if I recall, about the upcoming release of Dimensions, as a form of protest?

Dimensions was investigated, and it was eventually ruled that it didn't pass as child pornography under Swedish law - and the hentai artist, whose case instigated this affair to begin with, didn't suffer any legal consequences for his work, either. Nintendo still decided to withdraw the release of the game from Scandinavian territories, though, because of the scare this one fucking neckbeard put them through to prove a point.

(you'll notice I'm Swedish myself, so having to miss out on Dimensions pisses me the fuck off - fuck you, whoever you are)

So then - Marie, wouldn't you know, is Swedish.

She's clearly a two-fingered salute to that scandal, gothic lolita stylings and all.

She may be 18 in the design couments, sure, but that's not how she was designed, and you're delusional if you're trying to convince yourself otherwise. She was designed as an underage character, if only to rub salt in the wound. End of story.

Besides, you'll remember Dimensions was the first DOA game in the West to not list underage characters' ages simply as "N/A", which I'm guessing was an unfortunate oversight.

Why else, if not for all of the above implied reasons, do you think DOA5 put a sudden two-year gap in the timeline, so the youngest characters in the series (Ayane and Eliot, both 16) would have become 18 by the time that game takes place?

I'm sure the initial, "I'm a fighter", more serious direction of that game was part of the same initiative to scrub the DOA name clean. At least until the Japanese fanbase had a collective hernia and demanded their Jell-o oppai back.

EDIT: My bad, I believe it was a Swedish translator who was somehow discovered to be in possession of lolicon hentai manga, actually - not a hentai artist who was drawing anything of the sort. Sorry.

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

i don't see the japanese fans going apeshit beyond one feedback sentence in the interview, i don't see any heated discussions of it in their communities. five forum pages with enough text to publish as a book, however, is something i could safely call "going apeshit". why do only western fans do this?

I would honestly say Western fans are just as exceptional as Japanese fans in every case but I really don't see the point anymore.
I just dropped this topic since it's virtually a waste of time now for both parties since it's basically become "Did the developers make them with it in mind on purpose to capture the lolita community and is that bad or whatever" discussion and it's just a pointless endeavor now.

 

[Juihau]

And what is "being an adult"?, maybe being like Tina?, a even more immature character or Brad, being someone that is just taking adventage of Eliot. It's like being an adult is proof of being a super serious human being.

...Huh? What are you even going on about? I meant that she acts in such a way that makes it clear she knows she looks really young. Her personality literally doesn't work if she doesn't look like a young girl, because "knows she looks like a young girl and plays it up" is the basis for her mannerisms.

That sounds just like dodging the issue to avoid a direct discussion with people that can actually reply here and just throw accusations to people that can't defend for themselves.

It stands to reason that most of the people she was designed to pander to aren't here. She was made with a Japanese audience in mind, after all.

 

[Macca Beam]

I would honestly say Western fans are just as exceptional as Japanese fans in every case but I really don't see the point anymore.

same although i feel they deserve every bit of ridicule for the added arrogance and hypocrisy.

this topic has devolved into another typical opinion wanking contest with "is making X with Y audience in mind good/bad/right/wrong" as the new flavor (previously does it fit dead or alive, is it anime, etc.) never mind we're playing a series where every male and female is conventionally, intentionally attractive, but one case out of 50 identical others where something is designed for an audience (oxymoron) just has to affect some on a personal level, doesn't it? the sheer variety of excuses, accusations and even demonizations some are forcing themselves to go through to coat an "i don't like something" statement is truly fascinating.

anyhow, good to know neither dimensions nor the artist got into trouble. people who apply real human rights to drawings are deranged and should never succeed in their protests.

 

[Jyu_Viole_Grace]

...Huh? What are you even going on about? I meant that she acts in such a way that makes it clear she knows she looks really young. Her personality literally doesn't work if she doesn't look like a young girl, because "knows she looks like a young girl and plays it up" is the basis for her mannerisms.

And that is the reason why you are pointing at her as a minor, not just young, like if young people couldn't act like that.

It stands to reason that most of the people she was designed to pander to aren't here. She was made with a Japanese audience in mind, after all.

So the target audience are only Japanese people. I have a Japanese friend that could join this discussion, just to check if he casually isn't part of that audience.

I would honestly say Western fans are just as exceptional as Japanese fans in every case but I really don't see the point anymore.
I just dropped this topic since it's virtually a waste of time now for both parties since it's basically become "Did the developers make them with it in mind on purpose to capture the lolita community and is that bad or whatever" discussion and it's just a pointless endeavor now.

I know this is boring but I'm willing to keep this up as much as it takes, like people that just bring it up without any consequence and more when there are open defamation against other people.

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

same although i feel they deserve every bit of ridicule for the added arrogance and hypocrisy.

Eh then you do you. I just find this whole thing now very, very ridiculous and just makes both sides look dumb as hell.
That's why I chose to ultimately bow out because looking from the responses on the Western side, it's just as dumb to be frank and everyone looks dumber the more they continue it.

 

[werewolfgold]

the fact that honkers and nico were made to ride marie's popularity couldn't be more obvious. what i'm curious about is why wasn't there any analysis or meltdown when the college girls, post-college girls and the medium-sized males had the same height and build within their respective groups.

I think there's been commentary on the DOA girls looking like Stepford Wives in the past. But, with the revamp in artstyle in DOA5, everyone spread further apart in looks. And I've brought up copypasta character models before, but that doesn't catch fire as much.

But, the reason I keep bringing up the age thing is that before at least things seemed more organic in concept than they do now. 16, 17, 19, 22. Then 16, 17, 19, 21, 22. Then 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 24. Then 16, 17, 17, 18, 19, 21, 21, 22, 24. But, now we got 18, 18, 18, 18, 19, 19, 20, 21, 23, 23, 24, 26, 1018 (with three more 18s if you add the DOAXVV girls). It doesn't look right. It's very clearly "the same" in a way that can't be explained away by saying "we didn't have the time and resources to create that many differing character models."

It brings up the question of "why did this legion of 18-year-olds suddenly descend upon the series?" With an obvious answer (maybe not the answer, but an easy grab) being that 18 is the "safe" age, and they can't go younger than that, but introducing older ages wouldn't be as popular. If that age rule wasn't in place, we maybe would've gotten a less dumb, more organic spread of 16-18. Maybe even 15, which was Ayane's age in NG2, and they seemed to be fine with her looking like this...

Spoiler

But, maybe they really have turned over a new leaf and think that sexy girls under 18 shouldn't be done anymore for moral reasons. ...I kind of doubt it. I think they just don't want to get banned anymore.

do you mean the intonation and the occasional first-person? most of the lines look like average teenager speech to me. children usually screw up their sentence structures more, and a convention i've noticed in jp writing is the sentences are made almost entirely out of kana

That's a language thing. Some people use child to also include the teenage years, so it's wishy-washy. Marie (as well as Honoka and NiCO) at least look past puberty in my opinion, to get that clear. But, yes, the first-person, etc. is often employed to imply being pretty young.

Here you are pointing at people that like these characters and you are accusing them of prefering minors. There are people in this forum and in other forums that like these characters. So I will ask you this, are you willing to prove it?

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.

Where you keep surprising me is you still keep claiming that someone at certatin age should look in a certain way.

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.

Not everything, you can see her initial description hinting a "dark side" and some intros and win poses with a serious talk. She being disappointing in DOA 6 story mode is another thing (like the whole story mode imo).

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

What I have been saying is that NiCO is a answer to Marie Rose success and like I said several messages ago, her success is due being different to all classic female characters, not being a "18" character.

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.

 

[OriginalVizion7]

Eh then you do you. I just find this whole thing now very, very ridiculous and just makes both sides look dumb as hell.
That's why I chose to ultimately bow out because looking from the responses on the Western side, it's just as dumb to be frank and everyone looks dumber the more they continue it.

The Ugly American Syndrome..

 

[Lycanthrope -R-]

You guys having a party in here or what? lol

Marie isn't a 18 year old girl that looks like a "18" year old girl, she's a 18 year old girl that look like a 18 year old girl. That's a fact.

Spoiler

i don't see the japanese fans going apeshit beyond one feedback sentence in the interview, i don't see any heated discussions of it in their communities. five forum pages with enough text to publish as a book, however, is something i could safely call "going apeshit". why do only western fans do this?

Where are you looking? I've seen some Japanese comment screeds before. I don't have enough data to try to make any comparisons, though.

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

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

It's funny because even during the story mode, I never got kiddy from her. I got the typical anime girl you see in many, many anime, but I never exactly got kiddy. I do agree that they need to highlight it alot more of her self-awareness because it's obviously there but I also believe some people immediately take it to face value(It's honestly pretty amazing how people miss a few of her lines and even some of her actions showing that she knows what she looks like and has no problem with it or even use it).

I feel like at this point, it's going to be blatantly on the damn nose at this point and we are going to get the opposite reaction of that she's trying too hard to act like a kid next time.

 

[KwonJigglypuff]

Honestly her behaviour is less childish. No crying, and she appears less air-head and naive that Kokoro and Honoka reunited.

Spoiler

I didn't read you, we're talking about Marie-Rose right?

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

Honestly her behaviour is less childish. No crying, and she appears less air-head and naive that Kokoro and Honoka reunited.

Spoiler

I didn't read you, we're talking about Marie-Rose right?

Yeah I meant Marie Rose there.
She never honestly comes off to me as being too childish since her lines in her intro and outro makes it pretty frank she knows how small her body is in proportion to everyone else and uses it when she wants to(i.e. when she loses).

Honoka is honestly not even that much of an idiot(seriously where the fuck some of these people get that!?) as she is an airhead like Kokoro(She seems like an utter fangirl for trying to understand fighting styles and wrestling and simply doesn't realize how deep she can get into it can get some people negative about her).

And NiCO... yeah, I think people just say so because "small bodytype" despite her acting more adult than most of the female cast.

That's pretty much my final bit into this discussion as I'll discuss personalities, but that's it and nothing else.

 

[werewolfgold]

It's funny because even during the story mode, I never got kiddy from her. I got the typical anime girl you see in many, many anime, but I never exactly got kiddy.

Acting a bit childish is pretty common in anime, to play up the cuteness obviously. It's a very fine line. But the tantrums are what really sell it. I seem to recall a story scene where she might as well have been like "get out of my way, Bayman, you big meanie" and pounding on him like that when she's supposed to be trained martial artist.

There are also apparently more references to her wanting to be treated like an adult in DOAX3, but that's not my jam, so I don't know.

 

[Xhominid The Demon Within]

Acting a bit childish is pretty common in anime, to play up the cuteness obviously. It's a very fine line. But the tantrums are what really sell it. I seem to recall a story scene where she might as well have been like "get out of my way, Bayman, you big meanie" and pounding on him like that when she's supposed to be trained martial artist.

There are also apparently more references to her wanting to be treated like an adult in DOAX3, but that's not my jam, so I don't know.

Considering Bayman's girth AND the position he had her in, it's not like she could use any real decent Systema moves with the frame she has against someone as hulking as him.
But I would still give it to you anyway. But yeah DOAX3 apparently shows more of her wanting to be treated like an adult... which does lead to that problem of character development being in the side games more than the main game

 

[Raansu]

Considering Bayman's girth AND the position he had her in,

 

[Macca Beam]

not the biggest fan of the bayman encounter but it's obviously just done for a comedic effect. "martial artist efficiently disarming people" would be playing too straight and predictable, and serious doesn't mean serious all the time, right?

i do prefer she did something actually clever instead of pounding on him until he gives up though. they already had a damn unique premise of a character that doesn't have the brute strength or power of anime magic to breeze through everything, do something with it.

a character that deliberately uses something to their advantage should smoothly shut down anybody who questions it instead of getting mad about it, and they definitely shouldn't "want to be treated like an adult" because it's contradictory. i'm extremely tired of how much japanese writers embrace complexes.

Where are you looking? I've seen some Japanese comment screeds before. I don't have enough data to try to make any comparisons, though.

social media, things with a comment section, some obscure imageboards. not exhaustively of course but i sincerely doubt they have their own version of this thread rofl

 

[Kuga]

Fact that TN took into consideration and execution opinion of group of guys playing sub series is silly. But hey at least Shimbori had the balls to be honest.

Ok time for some IMHO. This series is starting to feel Itagakis absence in field of design. I Think he would not allow lolis in this series. He had good design taste and took pride in designing characters and their fighting style to be as realistic and climatic as they can be considerating flashy nature of the series. Fresh players may not be aware of this but i'm sure old ones remember movies from DoA3 era that were comparison of game character moves and real life martial artists. Itagaki was known for his distaste for Tekken and respect for Virtua Fighter. I just cant imagine him creating Marie, Honoka and NiCO with him holding to his principles. Hell im positive Nyotengu wouldnt come to existance either as we would get old and cool Tengu. Mila and Rig may have exist, but Diego - i dont think so, not in his current, plain form at least.

 

[Macca Beam]

we talking about this guy? seems to me he would reproduce all of 5 and 6's rosters if you gave him enough time.

itagaki had "good design taste" for many things. the stages, the unrealistic combat, many of the costumes, a deliberate avoidance of the grunge you see in the recent games. it was peak fantasy hand-to-hand fighting.

but not the characters. he drowned himself and died in tropes here. a person who can't tear himself away from one conventionally sexy body and face isn't what i'd call "good taste" either. this series had the reputation of looking like an illusion fap game well before itagaki left, you know.

 

[Kuga]

Yes i know this quote. But i was unable to find full article so im considerating it out od context until i will see full story.

In every other interview ive read he always states himsefl following his own philosophy. He for example criticized TN for their costume dlcs in doa5 by saying bluntly that he created doax series for purpose of casual fun with costumes and all.

Again, IMHO. Reputation of his games youre talking about about is also very subjective. There is nothing wrong with implementation od sex appeal of grown up women into the game. Reputation with such negative sound youre bringing up comes heavily from other fighting games communities that would assault DoA with empty arguments like "this game is all about boobz" etc.

As i said sex appeal od women in fighting games is fine. However todays TN takes that to a whole new level by presenting sex appeal of children. Arguments like "game says shes 18!" or "she acts mature" do not appeal to me when its obvious they were designed with underage appearance in mind, and the rest is to just have a argument aganist potential charges / law troubles.

 

[NewWestFan]

This Shimbori vs Itagaki debate is tired and old now. It bears no weight, like Itagaki himself now. The people that bring him up all the time are fans for sure, and that's fine. The current state aside DOA6 will be better off in the long run for everyone, who actually Plays DOA and doesnt spend most of their energy on watching it, without his influence. If Itagaki had any passion for fighting games he would have spear headed the development of his own in spite of his forced retirement from the DOA brand. He is more interested in sitting in obscurity taking shots at the series than he is proving himself correct.