One thing that I, and many others, always liked about Elder Scrolls games was that the armors of their female characters was as reasonable as the ones of their male counterparts. Well, maybe not Skyrim's Aela the Huntress, but in general. Ebony armor covers the whole body no matter the gender of its wearer. There were no boob cups and no cleavage windows. Armor was just internally consistent: female warriors had access to, and chose, armors that offered the same degree of protection. And that fits perfectly to the realistic art style of the Elder Scrolls world. And it was a quality of the series that was very appealing to many female players.

When seeing pictures, trailers, and game play videos for ESO, I was quite disappointed to find out that Zenimax Online Studios chose a different approach. Don't get me wrong, judging by what we saw so far ESO could still turn out to sixualize its female characters less than we see in other western MMOs like Guild Wars 2 and WoW - not to speak of all that stuff coming from Asia, like Tera, so perhaps it's a minor complaint, perhaps I should be happy enough. But if everyone else can invoke the Elder Scrolls single player games as standard for ESO, so can I. And compared to them, it's a step backwards.

My intention with this thread is just to state and to share this sentiment, in the hope of not being alone with it - and, of course, to show ZOS the err of their ways.

Edit: I want to formulate the last sentence more positively: Encourage ZOS to treat both genders with the same respect even if it means not pandering to one substantial share of their audience.

I had not noticed that but i agree to a certain point, but only if they would go over the top with it which i have not seen thus far!

Really?

boob windows dont bother me at all.

I don't see anything wrong with armor being a bit more sixualized for female characters as long as they are not over-the-top like in pretty much every Eastern MMO out there.

I don't like the argument of, "But if less armor they are less protected so that's not convenient!" Last time I checked this is a game and set in a fantasy world. I'm pretty sure in real life leather armor wouldn't protect me against a fire shooting sorcerer, but yet it seems to do that in the TES series.

I'm just not a big advocate of people saying things aren't just realistic this way or that way. TES world isn't realistic, because I'm not one shotting people with my axe when I hit them in the head. It takes like 15 hits before they even die. That's not realistic.

Sometimes it's fine to suspended reality and just let them do what they do. If they want to show some cleavage, let them show some cleavage. If they want this particular armor show some back, let it. Again, as long as it's not tiny pieces of thread hanging off the female characters, I think that it's all fine.

This is something I find a little annoying with the general consensus of the modding community this need to have all woman doing curvey poses whilst wearing skimpy "armour".

So we are just talking armor and clothing? Okay.

1. Skyrim had more revealing clothing than the ancient nordic armor. All fur armors, hide armor, studded and scaled are unnecessarily low-cut as well. Not even talking about forsworn armor and non-armor equipment like tavern clothes. And even those armors that cover up the chest accentuate briasts quite a lot. So to say this is not "Elder Scrolls" is quite a stretch.

2. Since the first screenshots back from the game's announcement, I haven't seen anything overly revealing in terms of armor or clothing from ESO. Much, much more stuff like http://images.uesp.net/7/72/ON-prerelease-25.jpg.

So if you have any specific problem, maybe you could provide a link?

I'm for more choice with armors. There should be both realistic armor and armor that is more fantasy type. Why stick to one boring type? I hate full plate armor personally and would like the choice of having armor that isn't like that.

Skyrim did have boob cups on female ebony and steel armors. But even that was nowhere near as stupid the boob windows in eso

The problem isn't that the armors are revealing but that the armors are revealing only on 1 gender. Skyrims fur armors and forsworn armors were just as small on males and females but on some sceenshots from eso you see the same armor on a male and female but the femle version seems to be missing about 20% of the plates.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:ON-prerelease-06.jpg

heres one example

I'm all for hit detection so if boob windows exist they should make it so you can be insta-killed if hit in the chest. The upper chest there holds some of the most vital organs that you'd want to protect in a fight don'cha'know.

I just prefer it to be like TES and not another MMO in all ways shapes and forms and while TES has always had female-defined armor variants, it's never been quite as overt as what we've seen from ESO so far which is just...dumb.

1. But those armors showed lots of skin irrespective of the gender of the wearer. And barmaids showing cleavage, that's not the issue for me at all.

2. I haven't said it's overly revealing, just somewhat revealing. Like this: http://playturn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/The-Elder-Scrolls-Online-gameplay-3.jpg. This is of course not an overly sixualized outfit, but still a bit impractical suicidal.

Now this is an approach I would welcome.

And another chance for ESO to stand out of the crowd, as it usually is the other way round.

imo, it's less of a realism argument as it is a feminist one. Female armor shouldn't be all that sixualized compared to their male counterpart to begin with. In Skyrim, most of the armors that are revealing on females are also revealing on males. That is fine, because that is the kind of armor it is. But when a male puts on, let's say Mithril armor, and it covers their entire body yet a female puts on the same exact armor and it turns out to be missing about 40% of its mass...there's a problem.

But I haven't seen this in most of the ESO screenshots, so I don't see where the complaint is. There's that one with the Orc and Redguard but I dunno, it looks so old and outdated and all the newer screenshots have normal female armor.

Yes some of us are grown up enough emotionally that we don't need to see armor clad boobs to enjoy a video game.

What? Ask a silly question.....

Not only would I have to disagree wholeheartedly, due to all of the "revealing" armor's Skyrim had (you even pointed out Aela, who was a main character)... but also, I think it's safe to say that the masses prefer the more revealing armor. The data probably wasn't hard to gather, all they had to do was look at every.single.screenshot.ever and see that people generally mod in more revealing armor.

This discussion comes up in every single MMO ever made, and it always ends the same way. More people choose revealing armor in their fantasy games.

It's been shown that females disagree. Google it, look at the polls. Usually only the metrosixual males bring up the "feminist" argument when it comes to revealing armor. Hell, my wife wont even play a game if she cant wear revealing armor. Funny how it works, when people play a fantasy game they want to look sixy or strong, based on some sort of... fantasy.

I bet you have no problem with all of the males in games being overly muscular and "sixy" too?

I will also add this, from recently revisiting GW2 I did start to notice the ridiculous boob fetishism in the game. Not just exposure and impracticality of armor, but the female norns all look like they were once completely flat-chested and all received the same DD silicone implants. It really does look ridiculous and is distracting in a bad way.

It just, overall, makes the game seem as though it's designed for idiots as the ONLY design justification for such an approach is to pique the interest of infantile and boob-obsessed men. There is no other reason.

The biggest boob window example I recall for ESO was the AD image with the purple Bosmer lady.

Oh, and how can we all forget this classic: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTGh0EMmMC8

I have to agree here. If anything the "feminist" argument comes from gaming males more than it does from gaming females. I, personally, know that all of my gaming female friends think it's stupid when games don't have the revealing armor and force them to only wear one monotonous set because the developer didn't want to be "offensive." It's more offensive thinking that women don't like wearing revealing clothes at all (uh like in real life).

This is the wrong way to look at it.... eh.. the ol' "it's just a game" is always the wrong way to look at any game that strives to support a semblance of context and plausibility within that context.

You don't see this in TES: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bifmj1O3D24

It's funny as heck, but it's out of place, and "It's just a game ~(anything's cool)" doesn't cut it with a serious work.

** What can be suitable/acceptable is the notion that an enchanted armor can be an odd and strange design and still work due to the enchantment; but a conventional suit of armor should ~never~ look like that.

I agree OP, we've had this heated discussion some weeks/months ago, and I promoted your views more or less. But as far as I can tell Zenimax are doing a good job on keeping armors realistic and not too "unrealistic-fantasy-esque-oh-i-gotta-look-fabulous-cause-my-toon-is-a-female" (just made that label up in my head in case it wasn't obvious). I like the armors I've seen so far, they're keeping it true to TES, it's fantasy but it's realistic and makes sense at the same time.

edit: also I agree with the guy above me.

edit2: and the guy below me.

There are plenty of vocal females who bring up the feminist argument (why you put that in quotes is beyond me), you're just not looking in the right places. I mean, this isn't an argument of "boob windows appeal to little boys and all women are angry", because I realize that there are females who like revealing armor. And that's good for them. But if you have an armor set that is SUPPOSED to be heavy plate, but when a female character puts it on it is suddenly completely different, that is where the problem is. If someone wants to wear revealing armor, they pick the fur or leather...not the steel plate.

As for your bet, I wish games had more customizable features so I didn't have to play the overly muscular barbarian brute. For once I just want to play a skinny, impoverished dude camping in the woods. But just with revealing armor, I put up with it because it's what sells and I can't deny that. I just don't think anything is lost if developers decide not to go the overly-sixualized route.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-item-Elven_Armor_Female.jpg http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130213014234/elderscrolls/images/thumb/f/f4/Nordic_Carved_Armor_-_Both.png/1000px-Nordic_Carved_Armor_-_Both.png http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-item-Steel_Plate_Armor_Female.jpg http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-item-Ebony_Armor_Female.jpg

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-item-Forsworn_Armor_Female.jpg

I hate boobplate with a burning passion. I want armor that is functional and protects my character's vital organs. If males can have it, I want it too.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't ask to completely remove all skimpy armors - as long as I can wear something I like, I don't care what clothes other people are using. Variety is crucial - I know that a lot of people like revealing armors, but just as many dislike them, so we should have a choice. Don't force my character to run around half naked just because she's female and I'll be happy.

Skyrim did it relatively well. Despite occassional boobplate heavy armor covered the entire body, so I'm okay with that design. TESO also looks very good. There was an atrocious Bosmer lady whose clothes screamed for an arrow through her belly and one Redguard with an unnecessary boob window, but that was a long time ago and all recent screenshots and gameplay videos show very reasonable clothes and armor.

Did you read anything I even wrote? I don't want armor to look like it does in the Asian MMO market, where it's basically just threads on a person. But at the same time there is nothing wrong with there being a bit more skin showing on female characters. And guess what it is just a game. This isn't real life I hope you know. Nothing in TES series would ever be allowed to happen in real life. Go wear a full plate of metal armor and run straight into someone shooting a flamethrower (because you know we don't have fire shooting sorcerers/dragons in real life) and tell me if you were able to survive that before he killed you. Guess what? You wouldn't. So please don't come in here acting that just because they decided to show a bit more skin on their female characters that suddenly it's too "unrealistic" that they would be able to survive in a fight.

The "reality" doesn't really go well in supporting OP's argument.

I mean, if people wear heavy plate armor and some Mage throws a few Fireballs their way, they'd be cooked alive in that thing.

But it doesn't happen in fantasy games.

So saying "realism" is the reason to TESO not have "boob windows" or whatnot is just not the way, in my opinion.

And before anyone jumps at me; No, I don't really mind either way. I never play a female character.

I like seeing some skin yes. I am a man after all. But I wouldn't care if we don't see any skin at all. I'm fine either way.

THe armor she wears makes more sense then if we would wear any kind of "male" armor that would hurt Sooooooo bad on the chest so armors looking like hers im all for makes sense and if it was me i would wear some kind of leather shirt under to cover upp the chest so it wound be a huge bullseye - HEY SHOOT ME HERE FOR INSTANT KILL x'D haha

And plate should cover more then leather but also they have to form the armor so it looks good and something we could wear for real.

Im gona try and find a good Female armor skin and post a pic.

EDIT I FOUND SOME with a quick google search something in this style.
http://www.wallsave.com/wallpapers/800x600/woman-warrior/71753/woman-warrior-women-sunsets-samurai-armor-asians-artwork-realistic-warriors-71753.jpg
http://i179.photobucket.com/albums/w315/Anastazja_2007/underworld3.jpg

Also Aelas armor in Skyrim isnt that bad just wear pants leather pants under it and BAAM real and good light armor.