SORRY NOT SORRY FOR THE LENGTH OF THIS ONE FOLKS, BUT IT'LL PROBABLY BE MY LAST (serious) ONE IN THE THREAD FOR OBVIOUS REASONS
Also Weapon, I get whatchu be saying, but I don't believe in just allowing things to go on unchecked because they're bothersome and FUK DA POLICE YOU AIN'T MY DAAAAAAAAD, so I don't need to be told a third time to let him be in his silly meandering.
P.S. Mr/Ms/Mrs Dracula9, could you be nice to other people please?
I'm "nice" to plenty of people.
Idiots who only value their own opinions and treat them like god's word are not one of them.
Don't like how you're being addressed? Change your tone. You get what you give. If you don't like blunt feedback and opinions then don't get on the Internet. Nobody owes you shit, least of all modifying their thoughts to be delivered to you on
your terms.
You clearly are only taking what is being said in this thread alone at face value and judging the entirety of someone's character from that single limited point of reference. Not my problem if you can't handle it. Certainly haven't earned enough of my respect to alter how I speak toward you.
Seth was called Seth in Ancient Egypt (also Suketh, Setesh ext.), not Greeks.
The "th" sound as we know it in modern English is not the same pronunciation in every other language to ever exist. Ancient Egyptian dialect generally pronounced our "th" with a sharper anunciation, to the point that in many cases it sounded akin to a flat "t" sound. One must also consider that where a linguistic is in a given word affects how it is pronounced.
Furthermore, yes, actually, it
did come from the Greek Hellenization, as Egyptian language was not structured the same way.
Let's look at Thoth, who also has the "th" sounds. What's his original Egyptian name?
Ḏḥwty. Now, you wanna try and pronounce that in English and tell me it's correct? Sure, we have the Romanized
Djehuti, but that's still not "correct" or even accurate to the original, as many words of such ancient languages are merely estimated as to their proper pronunciation by historical language analysts.
One must also consider the preferences of any particular sect.
Sutekh was particularly favored by the Hittites, and such was the name they attributed to the same or a similar enough deity. In reality, there's not really a singular "correct" name in regards to the original language. That being said, though, relying on Hellenizations or Romanizations or any other country, people, religion, and/or language's attempts at localization as if they
are even remotely accurate to the source is a demonstration of misguidance.
If that does not work, we can put anything, anything but damn Astarte(the true intention of putting that heart attack is so obvious)! Hell, even can put Elgiza monster there as a boss!
Nice double negative. "You can put anything" cannot be rationally followed with "EXCEPT FOR." I consider this statement moot and utterly useless due to this contradiction. Just flat-out proves you don't actually care about anything but your own opinion, since we can do "anything"
except what you don't like. That's not how "anything" works.
Also, my reason for ridding out sexualized characters is that (well, I don't like sexualized characters personally, and I think that sexual theme is what's ruining Japanese gaming industry (least not for Nintendo), but) it doesn't fit with Castlevania.
I'd say "subjective," but the fact that it's so laughably wrong is more important, I think.
Castlevania's about vampires. Vampires are and always have been inherently tied to sexuality by their very nature as carnal creatures.
Case closed there. End of story. I could elaborate much,
much further as to how thematic elements of CV relate inherently to elements of the sexual, but vampires are its prime subject matter and vampires are all I need to reference to disprove your statement.
If you see early games, you wouldn't see any deliberately sexualized characters until Rondo with the lady on a skull (Carmila, I believe to be).
Where to start...
Medusa, CVIII. Tits. I assume based on how pitifully shallow your definitions of sexuality are that you consider breasts and generally the female form to be inherently sexual, which is pretty much a sexist opinion to begin with. The human form is not inherently sexual. Acts of sexuality are sexual. A pair of tits isn't, unless they're being used in a sexual manner. Medusa here has no such context.
Leviathan, CVIII. Leviathan in Hebrew scripture once had a female counterpart who was slain by God to prevent the two from procreating. Boy, that's pretty sexual in nature, isn't it? God killing your only female so the two of you can't fuck? Well, perhaps going to Hebrew scripture for a winged devilbeast who only shares the name is a bit of a stretch, but then so is most of your argument, so I think me making stretch points is fair game also.
Medusa, Haunted Castle. See above argument for tits.
Harpy, Haunted Castle. Clearly visible nipples, even. Once again, see CVIII Medusa argument for tits.
Medusa, SCVIV. Same argument.
Rolling Stone, Haunted Castle. Same argument.
There are others, plenty of them, but this is enough to prove my point.
What's more, your argument is that Carmilla is naked.
Naked. That's it.
No mention of the fact that she and Laura are easily able to be implied (by the very nature of the source material, vampirism's inherent sexual qualites, and other contextual factors) as lovers, or that Laura prances around in a standard Japanese sexy battle unitard, or that she can kiss you rather passionately and steal hearts from you (which is basically an inversion of the Astarte attack you oh so clearly loathe).
Just that Carmilla's naked.
Once again, your nigh-sexist consideration of the female form as inherently sexual is both bullshit and laughable.
There's also the whole "save the helpless damsels from the evil clutches and intentions of Dracula (a man)" plot device, or that Maria (a twelve-year-old) has a few of the usual Japanese upskirt tease shots in her ending. But these don't have any sexual overtones or couldn't be interpreted as such, nope. Never a chance.
You see, most of... those games are considered perfect.
Subjective and objectively unprovable.
Nobody condemns on it with character designs.
Also objectively unprovable. Character design wasn't a focal point like it is now due to limitations of hardware, so there was never much pixel-translations of character design to run with. Character art existed, you know.
Also, The theme running in Castlevania is: "Belmont/Alucard/Soma or whoever beating crap out of intimidating monsters and pushing evil Dracula/Chaos and ext. to its doom" or "Badass Gothic Horror Action Game". Well, does the Succubus fit in the category of "Badass" or "Intimidating"?
*ahem*
1: "Gothic Horror" means Gothic-archetype demons and enemies. Succubae are one of these.
2: "Intimidating" is largely subjective, but are you trying to say that a demon that almost 100% successfully seduces all of its victims and then uses normally-positive things like sex acts to drain them of their life energies and ultimately either turn them into their thralls or kill them outright
isn't something which would be cause for intimidation? Sex is great and generally we humans enjoy it, so twisting an act so near and dear to us as a species into a death sentence is pretty fucking intimidating as a concept to me.
3: "Badass" is also highly subjective, but see the above. Turning something your victims enjoy into something to be feared and avoided lest they suffer horrible fates is pretty fucking badass from a perspective of effective strategy against one's enemies/victims.
4: No, the running theme of Castlevania is good vs. evil, humanity vs. inhumanity, the secular against the dark unknown. Badass warriors against badass forces of evil is just a byproduct of those themes as has
always been the case.
If done right, female characters can fit in the series like SotN Maria or CV3 Sypha.
Once again, your concept of what "fits" is entirely based on the offensively infantile way you view women as characters. God forbid a particular female character is more strongly in touch with her sexual side than another.
Maria is also pretty hot in Symphony, with many of the same design elements (short skirt, stockings, thighs exposed, graceful movements exemplifying the female form, general exquisite elements of beauty and attractiveness) you've been complaining about. Either bitch about
all examples, or none of them. Don't get to cherry pick which designs guilty of your condemnations are "valid" for complaint or not.
Why is that so hard?
Because Maria has always been an ass-kicker and Sypha stomps ass with her magic for a grand total of one game (Fake Sypha doesn't count in my book since, well, it's not actually Sypha and the boss itself is rather weak).
We have Yoko who stomps ass with magic, Sonia who kicks some serious ass, Charlotte who's got some seriously powerful magic at her disposal (despite being more than a little sexualized in the traditional Japanese schoolgirl-type way, but PoR had the anime style so any anime tropes are a given), and last but not least Shanoa who stomps ass
and utilizes some of
the most powerful magic elements in the series (can't be too many who can use Dracula's own power effectively enough to control its target and damage, as we've seen in Dawn and Aria).
All these female characters also happen to have their own types of attractive designs, some of which have more sexualized elements than others, but in many cases it fits their character--Charlotte has a bit of that sheltered bookworm trying to be something more thing going, as seen in both how overconfident in herself and comically naive she can be at times; Yoko's design is conservative outfit-wise as far as skin shown, but she still has the stockings/heels combination which is somehow
always sexual in nature, and her personality is rather befitting of the conservative-but-not-Puritan design she runs with; Sonia wears essentially the female equivalent of what male Belmonts wear, so I don't wanna hear a fucking word from you about that; Shanoa's got the flowing dress and armored boots going on, the completely revealed back is entirely explained for Glyph absorption and the flowing dress isn't any different from other characters' flowing capes and robes except that it's on a female body instead.
The only reason you find this "hard" is because your standards are so ass-backwards and contradictory there simply aren't any true cases that fit your standards without contradicting. In reality (something it doesn't appear you like to deal with), what you're calling "hard" has been done plenty of times in the series and then some--you just have a hard time admitting to or even seeing it, as you're so concerned with your borderline-Puritan ideals of female sexuality.
Also, I started to hate sexualized characters when I heard about Pachislot and Pachinko. Let's take Sypha for example and compare that with Dracula's curse version. Which do you think is better for Castlevania? Answer is already there.
You're right. I much prefer her CVIII incarnation. But it has absolutely nothing to do with her design or how sexualized she is. I like CVIII more because she's actually capable of doing things and has an arc to follow. It stems nowhere from consideration of sexual tones, but entirely from me disliking the Pachinko titles to begin with due to their bastardization of what makes the games past enjoyable--and no, none of that has to do with sexualization either. Traditional Castlevanias are fun, Pachinko Castlevanias are not. Pure and simple.
At the end of the day, your argument is entirely one of blatant cherry-picking and I dare say blankented sexism.
You've done a lot of bitching and moaning about slender lithe females in revealing outfits and how that apparently causes irreparable harm to the series as a whole due to what I can only imagine is perceived role model influence or some asinine point similar to it.
Don't see you bitching much about Scwarzenegger macho-men with manly buff muscles and manly angry eyebrows and manly stern expressions and big macho man power walking or any of the other male equivalent content to what you
have been whining about.
For you see, if revealing clothing showing off the body is sexual on females, then it's also true for males. The only guaranteed part of the human body to perpetually carry sexual overtones are the genitalia themselves. That's the act they were mostly made for (barring the other biological uses such as waste removal, yes I know those are a thing too), so the overtones are present by nature.
Pair of tits? Not inherently sexual, and if you see a pair that way then the fault is on you. Since you only seem to care about female portrayals, I'm gonna draw a logical conclusion based on your singling out of the gender and how cherry-picked and contradictory your arguments have been and say that, whether you care to admit to it or not (or even if you're capable of consciously acknowledging it), you objectify the female form and proceed immediately to antagonize it for showing off any more than you're comfortable seeing.
Don't like seeing a pair of tits or a female character comfortable in her own sexuality? Perfectly fine. What's not fine, though, is putting your singular tiny opinion on a pedestal like any accusation or condemnation you make is irrefutable, since as we can all plainly see, they can be easily and rather largely refuted.
I, for one, am not a big fan of the continued "macho man doing macho man things" trope for male protagonists. I don't like too much the frequency it's used and the corresponding messages that frequency can send. I much prefer the male characters in the series that manage to maintain the same or similar (or even greater) levels of badassery and generally just being interesting characters
without being hulking barbarian Schwarzeneggers in tiny little codpiece armor onesies (see: Soma, most recent Dracula iterations, Isaac, Alucard, Juste). But you don't see me bitching and moaning and pontificating like my opinion is law and that I'm absolutely correct and that the things I dislike about a series are bringing the whole series down just because I don't like it.
So let me go back to my first rebuttal:
P.S. Mr/Ms/Mrs Dracula9, could you be nice to other people please?
Don't like how I'm talking to you?
Well, first and foremost, too bad. I'm violating no forum rules by deconstructing your argument and presenting counterclaims for every fragmented piece, which would be the only true punishment or incentive to speak otherwise.
Second off, it's not my fault or problem if you can't understand the notion of "if you aren't prepared to have your opinions argued, debated, deconstructed, rebutted, attacked, broken down, shattered, reduced to their bare minimum, or otherwise met with counters and opposition, then don't fucking post them on the Internet." This isn't some happy fairytale playground where everyone gets along and agrees with everyone else and there's no confrontation about anything ever. People grow and learn shit by having their worldviews and opinions beaten and dragged through the mud by those of others. If you don't have the spine to handle that, then frankly no amount of pleading and admonishing me will give me any incentive to relent.
Third off, and I'll repeat myself from the beginning of the post, you have done nothing to earn enough of my respect for me to consider you and your opinions worth marginalizing myself and my own for your own sake. There are plenty such people I restrain things and mannerisms for, and all of those people in some form or another have my respect enough to make such considerations--some are just great people, some have proven valiant and worthy opponents on the debate field, some have maybe said or done things in the past that I greatly respect the intentions and/or delivery of, any number of things. What have you done for me to harbor the same feelings? So far, nothing. You made a dumb post, I rebuked it, and since that first interaction you have done absolutely nothing to consider the arguments and possibilities of validity of the other side of your opinions. And before you say that I haven't considered your side, yes, I absolutely have. I wouldn't be breaking down and debating each point of yours if I hadn't, since breakdown and countering of points requires some level of understanding of what those points are trying to say. I've also been around the series for a very long time and have thought about aspects of the series for a very long time, so many of the points you've raised (terrible as some might be) are ones I've long since had myself and either discarded the misinformed or useless ones or modified them accordingly to be more wholesome. Doesn't appear to me thus far that you're willing or even capable of doing those things with your own views; therefore, I see no reason to, essentially, dumb myself and my opinions down just so your feelings don't get hurt. I'm not gonna coddle you and avoid your precious fucking bubble--had mine broken years and years ago by members of this very community, and I'm glad they did; otherwise, I might still be floating around in my own sheltered little opinion bubble and still be just as spineless and incapable of dealing with any form of criticism towards my views as I was then.
Fourthly, my general rule is that "the stupider the argument, the more likely to be an ass/hit a bit harder/have a few lulz and fuck with the OP I am." The more seriously an argument is presented to me, the more seriously I regard it. And while I have no doubts that you take your opinions and arguments very seriously, the content itself is rather lacking in seriousness due to just how contradictory and I daresay hypocritical they are. Therefore, I take the arguments themselves less seriously despite full awareness and acknowledgement that the presenter of them is completely serious.
If I had any doubts as to your integrity and seriousness, I'd have long since started shitposting in reply by now. Dumb arguments meant as shitposts/flames/whatever are usually easy to spot, and occasionally I enjoy having a bit of fun with them since nobody's being serious about it.
So bear that in mind. You might not like how I've been and until further notice will continue to address you and your arguments, but do remember that if not for my understanding and respect of your clear seriousness I could in all guaranteed likelihood been far "worse" based on what you currently seem to have a distaste for. Just like many aspects of life, it could always be worse; so without meaning to sound condescending or patronizing (with apologies if this next bit does, which it likely will due to the nature of what it's saying), I honestly think you should have a little more tact and courtesy than just begging and pleading for me to be "nice" to you because you don't like what I'm saying. Do you think I just copy and paste this kind of shit without an effort or care in the world? Long-winded posts like this take a long fucking time to compose and structure, so that should give you some measure of indication that I'm at least taking your shit seriously enough to give it thoughtful and rational replies in return. I could've shitposted them and Photoshopped memes of Exodia and Dark Magician onto Castlevania characters to illustrate the ridiculousness of that one point, or compiled any number of visuals and artwork of every female character in the series and ironically highlight all their exposed ankles or visible necklines and joke about the "barbaric" and antiquated nature of such views towards women and the female form, or any number of shitposty things I felt like doing (several members, mostly Plottwist, know exactly what I mean by this and exactly what levels of shitposting I can delve to, so I'm not being arrogant or cocky when I say you
really should be glad I've gone this route instead).
But I didn't. Because I respected your opinions and arguments enough to take them seriously enough to warrant proper retorts and counterarguments.
But I'm still the big meanie asshole. Gotta love that shit.
Anyway, this has been too much of a post already and probably my last offtopic one in the thread since we're hitting some rather heavy levels of derailing.
You want me to be "nicer" to you? Then give me a fucking reason to do so, starting preferably by ceasing your incessant begging for it. Respect isn't handed to you on a platter because you want and demand and plead for it. That shit's earned. So quit with the entreaties and imploring for it already.