The other day I heard this in another context although with the same bias. I would always caution thinking your opinion is shared by a majority until you have gathered sufficient data.

No one is afraid. The main problem with female characters is they are boring. They always are written to be badass and amazing from the start and you end up with a less interesting version of a male character.

When I think of great stories they usually have a weak or very flawed character that has failed hard. Like The Count of Monte Cristo or something contemporary like Rocky or Karate Kid.

These stories are interesting because the charter is not bad ass. They suck. They fail hard. But then they learn, grow, have a redemption arc whatever and finally achieve something great.

But writers don't let female characters be shown as failures. They have to be portrayed as amazing and strong from beginning to end. And the way they are portrayed is strong like a man rather than strong as a woman.

That's boring.

Was it rather unfortunate timing for the announcement now that seemingly everybody and their mother expects every female character model to have the facial structure of Adriana Lima in her prime, with at least Double D-Cup mammary glands and a round, jiggly booty to boot?

Yes, definitely.


Does Ciri's face look as defeminised and unflattering (up to the point of being likened to Star Wars: Outlaws' protagonist) as it's made out to be?

No, I don't think so.
Reportedly Witcher IV takes place several years after the events of Witcher 3 and those years (potentially full of hardship) naturally take a toll on one's body, including the face. And inherently even more so on women than on men, especially in regards to the skin.

Thus the more seasoned, weathered and chubby-cheeked/-chinned features. Like most people tend to develop during the aging process.

And to reiterate on an important point made earlier - the in-game character model's face ALWAYS looks different than its counterpart used in cinematics.
Geralt being the prime example here.

I have no problem admitting I am very wimpy, and yet you sound even more wimpy than I am with such immature comments. She was already a badass in Witcher 3 and the books, that wasn't never in question, and if your only measure of badass is raw power, she was far more badass than Geralt. She was a god(ess) walking among men, not a mere witcher. Geralt surely wasn't such an endearing videogame character to many because he was badass in such sense, but because of his humanity, flaws and virtues.

So no, I am not against badass Ciri, I am against girlboss Ciri. What's a girlboss but a woman who practices "toxic masculinity"? If I want "toxic masculinity" in my games, I'll go playing a fucking Warhammer game with Khorne faction and build pyramids out of the skull of my enemies or something similarly violent and depraved.

Where in the trailer did you see any "toxic masculinity"? That's right, you saw none. You are only speculating that the game will be "infected" with "toxic masculinity". You are the one with insecurity's, that cannot handle a more mature and grown up Ciri, and only see devils in the dark corners where there are none.

Me myself? I am not afraid of anything. Why should I? I am going to buy and play the game from start to finish. Can you say the same?

Edit: Just realized this thread got political. I'm going to peace out.

Your mention of the Count of Monte Cristo reminds of Sarah Connor in Terminator 1 and 2. Both Dantes and Connor begin weak but trough traumatic event became more powerful, "badass" character. But they lose most of their humanity in process, and that's not shown as a good thing.

However I'll take T2 Sarah Connor over modern day strong female characters because her jerkass behavior is shown as something tragic and to be avoided; not a role model to be followed.
Batman sucks at interpersonal relationships, and when written well once in the Blue Moon must usually outsmart more powerful opponent. Mary Sues usually don't have such problems.

It really takes a certain something to take a character who literally spent 20 years doing nothing but training and learning from the best in the world and say he's "magically good at everything".

That said, this thread has absolutely become the gamer frogs by now. We got literally nothing but a trailer showing an established character doing stuff we already know her to be good at and looking pretty much exactly the way she's always looked only maybe 5 years older AND EVERYONE IS JUST LOSING THEIR DAMN MIND WHERE IS THE VOLCANO WE NEED TO JUMP

Let's assume that's true. I still don't feel excited to play an entire game as Ciri. I didn't feel excited to play Metal Gear Solid 2 as Raiden either. Some characters just don't carry an entire game for me.

But I'm open to having my mind changed in the future.

I think this is a likely answer that isn't getting enough respect.

I remember when Gears of War decided to dedicate two instalments to a mother/daughter story after having established itself as a game about brotherhood and men fighting together. They didn't sell very well as you can imagine. It was not that Gears fans disliked women in games, it was that the developers replaced the iconic characters they spent years building with side characters but pretended it was the same game when it really wasn't.

With that being said, I don't spend much time on game drama these days so I don't even know if anybody actually cares outside of the theatrics in this thread.

In any case, this is all besides the point. 99% of you aren't going to be able to play this game regardless if it's on Unreal 5.

Is there a Witcher 3 ending with Ciri becoming Empress? Good thing I didn't get that. Doesn't sound right for the character at all.

Some lore points that I didn't understand:

- Why is she now suddenly a Witcher, able of drinking their potions, poisons, having their eyes..etc? How?
- Witchers were dying off (right?), iirc, if there were another school to train her and do the process that only man can bear, where it was? Who did it? Geralt? Yennefer?
- Witcher 3 true ending, end on a good note, right? I mean, wasn't she supposed to fix things going there? (or am I confusing everything) So why the shift focus on "everything is dark and terrible again and our girl is all alone killing monsters as a monster hunter for survival doing jobs no one else can"?

I don't mind her appearance much, as others have complained.
Yes she does look more like a man now with this big jaw (weird big jaw), but still "acceptable beauty" to how gorgeous she was on Witcher 3. Also she's older, and also more experienced, in theory, but the trailer makes her look like she is still learning how to deal with things alone, though she looks much older and experienced - by looks alone.

- I heard there were 2 women that became Witchers on the books lore, none of them were Ciri, because in the books she didn't needed to become a Witcher, because of, well, who she is.
- Will Geralt show up as a master to her again? Did he made her go through the trials with help of Yennefer powers?

Ah yes this thread is full of Old Men Yelling at Clouds...