I think what we're missing is just, characters who are either aware of their sex appeal - such as Nyotengu, Tina or Christie - or characters who may be sexy, but are treated by the game earnestly, like the rest of the female cast pre-Marie.
As it is, we have characters who could be interesting additions, if not for the meta sort of way the game treats them, from their framing in the story right down to the camera work.
VV has made this worse, because all there is to that game is the fucking camera work, lmao.
If the community makes something of a certain character, that's fair - but when the express purpose on the devs' part is nothing but eye candy, you're kind of stuck with an empty pastiche of some anime trope to project onto. A waifu, if you will.
I miss when Hitomi used to walk away from fights asking "isn't there anyone better around here", you know?
That is to say, the rest of the cast have been retroactively painted with the same brush - even as early as Dimensions, but they at least had pre-established personalities they couldn't veer too far away from.
Whoever's in charge of the story doesn't know what they're doing, basically, which informs every other design choice TN makes going forward. It's sad.
