Seriously? This bugs me to no end.
I stumbled on this a couple of weeks ago when I fired up my twitch stream for Single Player Sundays. There was a steam forum post about this mod and naturally, being the curious (okay PERVERTED) person that I am I clicked the link. Boy did I regret that decision. Instead of seeming like some silly attempt at fulling desperate male tween's sexual fantasies it seemed somewhat disrespectful as well as unnecessary. Realistically, I probably shouldn't care, after all My favorite female character of all time is Isabella "Ivy" Valentine and well... I'll let the character concept art speak for itself:
But while the differences seem slight on the surface there is one elephant in the room that I just can't ignore. While Ivy was designed out of the box to be sexualized, Lara Croft wasn't, not in this iteration:
Lara Croft is a survivor and the adventure is gritty, edgy and a lot more realistic than Soul Caliber ever even tried to be. So to sexualize her to me is just wrong. Just to be clear this isn't a sanctioned skin by Crystal Dynamics, it's a third party mod made by a lone developer. Chances are the game's publishers have taken exception to the mod the same way I have. In fact if you read some of the comments some of them object to the unrealistic nature of the skin. But if lack of realism is the core issue then why aren't more people objecting to these skins?:
I mean seriously? A competition archer's costume? Sure it's cool and it goes along with the use of the bow (SPOILERS: Lara finds a compound bow later in the game) but she has absolutely no reason to be wearing it at all on a ship out at sea. The hunter's outfit is probably the only one that's MORE ridiculous than the nude skin since it makes her look like some rich bitch safari hunter shooting cancer stricken lions or some other such shit. COMPLETELY out of character for Lara.
So then, why does the nude skin bother me so much? Why can I just blow off the costumes I mentioned above but the nude skin just makes me want to eat glass? In all honesty I have the same objections to to all of them, they're out of character and unrealistic in a game that is largely based on realism. I mean it's all harmless fun right?
Or is it? Honestly, I think it is harmful at least a little. I mean why is it every female character simply MUST become nude or show cleavage and legs or be sexualized in some way? This has been an issue for a long time and I'm all for sexual characters in media but it's a tightrope for sure. The only reason I'm not as critical of Ivy's costume is because the game itself is designed to be over the top and fantastical. Things like swords NOT cutting their skin, the sheer amount of physical damage the characters could absorb and just jump back up and keep fighting as if nothing happened, NO injuries are sustained (although clothing is lost), shit like that. It's so far removed from reality it's really hard to care what anyone is wearing. Tomb Raider on the other hand is very realistic. You can believe that somewhere on Earth some people are having this adventure and fighting for their survival in this way. So to make Lara run around naked is to maybe imply that you aren't taking her character seriously when she is meant to be taken seriously. Or worse, you are sending a message that she should only be taken seriously if she's nude which is bullshit. We don't need to see women characters naked all the time, we don't need EVERY woman character there ever was or ever will be to be flashing their ass and tits when they're fighting for their lives. It's disrespectful, its over done and quite frankly I'm over it. Stop it, just STOP!