(character limit; part 1/2) I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to reply, how to analyze exactly what I’ve just read and objectively confront it.
This is a lengthy read (habits form when you’ve written your fair share of thesis papers and essays) and I don’t know if anyone’s going to see it, let alone if Riot will or if anyone else will give it a fair and open-minded chance, but I do believe someone needs to take what has been said here to task.
Because looking at this from multiple angles always brings me to the same conclusion; if this is Riot’s official stance, than that makes this post an alarming one. This is not me speaking from personal opinion, emotion, or want of any particular champion design; that would be beside the point. After objective analysis and through measured opinion, I say that this is cause for concern. I may understand where exactly the decision may have come from, but it’s a misguided position.
To say right from the start, there is a serious and blatant flaw in the reasoning of how a push has been made to design more “progressive” champs visually for the sake of “diversity”. A flaw and a double-standard; this rationale is only being applied to female champs and/or male players and artists (which is a fallacious assumption to begin with, but more on that later); not to male champs and/or female players and artists.
Two recently created champions are Braum and Yasuo. These, of course, are male champions. Braum and Yasuo are shirtless with very muscular bodies. Now, I’ve heard that the reason, at least for Yasuo, for this male character design concept came from female workers at Riot raising awareness that they had no (rather, little; Lee Sin, Varus, and others were already around) female-oriented fanservice, in the way of so-called “sexualized” male champions. I have no way of knowing if the person who said this was telling the truth, but it does sound like a conceivable chain of events.
What makes the post I am replying to alarming is the glaring and undeniable double-standard present; Riot sounds like they have been discouraging their art teams from catering to male audiences on the basis of them wanting to “mature”, but have absolutely no problem with eye-candy for female audiences, i.e. manservice in their champion designs? You are not allowed to cherry-pick if you’re going to deem something “immature” but only condemn specific things.
For that matter, I would think a lot of people, players and artists alike, would find it highly insulting to be labeled immature because they happen to appreciate beauty. By this logic the ancient Greeks must have all been children, because they had a great reverence for the athletic human body which is clearly reinforced in their historical art. Would anyone argue that the Greeks were morally corrupt over that?
I say again: Why is it now okay when males are sexualized for female audiences, but not when females are “sexualized” for male audiences?
This problem wouldn’t be exclusive to Riot. This is everywhere in fictional artwork and writing; people will make a fuss over the representation of female characters for a multitude of reasons, but if a male character is dressed (down) like Conan the Barbarian, or if their personality is uninspired and demeaning to certain types of real men, not a word is said about it.
So this led me to ask; did this paradigm shift happen because Riot wanted to no longer provide fanservice to males (or females who like such character designs; yes, girls like that are real and can appreciate art)? Because of manservice champions like the two I have already brought up, not to mention skins for many others that continue to be released, I really doubt it. So is it really “diversity”?
I find it hard to accept diversity as the reason. League of Legends has over one hundred champions and the number grows every year. That’s a lot of playable characters. And there have always been dozens upon dozens of original, distinctive character designs. We have fantasy humans, warriors, magicians, alongside gun-toting modern humans; the plethora of Void creatures and Shadow Isle archetypes, all of the different gnome-like Yordles. And then you have anthropomorphic or surreal champions such as Renekton, Azir or Nasus. League is already very full of character diversity.
Which led me to wonder if Riot enforced this out of fear of accusations of “sexism” in their character designs. Putting aside the fact that “sexism” has become a subjective buzzword that lost its original meaning, and that one could easily make the argument that the vast majority of female League of Legends characters are not sexist at all (or that they could even be empowering for female viewers), what makes this unsettling is that in spite of the motive being to avoid offending groups of people, it directly impacts three major groups anyway;
First, the artists. The artists are, of course, those who bring these champion concepts to life through their drawings, and later model design and animation. These are people who have a passion for art and are privileged to be able to use that passion to make a living. When an idea is stifled either by superiors or by outside protestors, the artist is hurt and so is his or her creativity. This is also dangerous for artists who may want to work for Riot in the future, and not just the ones working there currently, who may be discouraged by such methods of control.
Second, the male players. This seems like it would go without saying, but it’s worth bringing up regardless. No one would realistically know the exact statistics on the amount of players who care about League’s art, let alone the people who are wondering what happened to the more fantasy-oriented designs. However, it’s probably a safe bet that the number is significant. I prefer not to use this phrase as it often comes across as a negative term, but “sex” does sell. That is, people like attractive characters, and there is nothing inherently wrong with beauty. Related to that, Riot benefits financially through people who will purchase RP for champions or skins, particularly ones that they like visually.
Third, the female players. Again, I wouldn’t know how many female video game players are on League of Legends, but it would be presumptuous (and sexist) to say that only guys play it. Regardless of what fedora-wearing white-knights will say, women can appreciate fanservice-y character design and fictional art just the same as men. Why exclude them? Why say, “Look, we know we used to draw like this, but now we’re scared of outspoken feminists deeming us sexists. So you’re not allowed to appreciate any depiction of beauty from here on in”? That sounds far more demeaning to women than any character design could be. These characters are not real; they are living in a fictional, fantasy world with its own cultures, logic, and rules and should not influence how a person in real life acts, or have an effect on how they view themselves.
If it is about “sexism”, and not about either excluding people who actively want certain types of characters or about being diverse, then it too is a flawed premise. If anything, the irony here is that actual traditional feminists and egalitarians would be praising League of Legends for female representation; there are so many female champions who fit the bill of “brave, strong, and independent”; a somewhat overused string of words, but it really does ring true.
Karma, Janna and Ashe are three prominent examples of strong female characters. All three are female champions with leadership and virtuous qualities.. which are disregarded because people are distracted by what they’re wearing and judge their personalities based on that instead, which is asinine. Ashe is a wise and influential political leader, believes in unity, peace, mercy; overall, Ashe is an idealistic and virtuous character. Yet I honestly find it frightening that people will overlook all of her personal qualities and instead whine or laugh about how she wears a skirt and what looks like a tank-top. Like.. really?
In fact, Karma could be among the most progressive, positive female champions in the game. She is firmly a good person, a very strong and wise Ionian leader, and wields powerful magic on top of it all. But she shows off her legs, and there are the Sun Goddess and Order of the Lotus skins, but that doesn’t change her personality. What she wears should have no bearing whatsoever on Karma’s impact as a female character.
To elaborate on an example that does fall on the other end of the spectrum, and to show that I’m being as objective as possible, I will say that Evelynn could be argued as a sexist design. But that’s because her character archetype is essentially that of a succubus! She’s an evil character who isn’t intended to be looked up to. For that matter, Evelynn isn’t exactly what you would call “beautiful”. The same concept of character archetype applies to the likes of LeBlanc and Syndra, but even Diana could be perceived as an evil, non-role model character as she wants to violently convert everyone to lunar worship, and is especially opposed to the rest of the Targon population in their reverence of the sun, or you could say Vi isn’t really a heroine as she’s a reformed brawn-over-brains criminal who isn’t all that remorseful; she’s just content to be able to beat things up for the police instead of doing jail-time. (And let’s not get into her portrayal in the updated Summoner’s Rift login screen; so much for clothing alone being what determines how “sexual” a character is)
And then there are examples of characters who are technically wearing fanservice-y outfits, but the character herself isn’t sexual, like Jinx and Shyvana. The former is hard to take seriously and has unusually pale skin, and the latter is humanoid, but not very human-like; being a half-dragon after all.
. Now some of these you might disagree with, but I find them all overly sexualized in one way or another. If it isn't there base skin, then they have one skin that is very suggestive.
's new splash has your number (and her glacial skin). One could also argue that 
's pool party skin is sexy in its own way as well.
