theNater said:
Rocket boots don't have to have heels on them. The actual heels do not provide benefits.
Fair enough, but you can't just divorce the aesthetic from the practicality that easily. While incorporating practicality into a character's costume design is important it's almost universally secondary to aesthetic. JRPG characters are probably the worst example of this, with superfluous buckles and tassels everywhere. "Does this look good?" is a more important question than "Is this practical?", and while you can argue the heels
don't look good that's a whole other discussion.
theNater said:
Internal consistency is important, even if realism isn't. It is video game logic, but that's not the same as saying anything goes.
So how do the rocket heels violate the consistency of the game?
theNater said:
Characterization is more than just what people say. Among other things, it's what they choose to wear. Samus has been overall fairly consistent in her gear choices to date, and this is a significant deviation from that.
I agree she's always been more for boots, but I don't see the heels as a
significant deviation. Nintendo have been steadily sexing her up for a while now, and while I don't particularly like that design choice I don't see it as negating or deviating from what Samus was (which was practically a blank slate - you could create a dozen different personalities that would all make sense with what you see in game). And that's the problem, really - a lot of people, particularly in the west, became attached to the personalities
they created for Samus, and when she was finally given more character and revealed to be another generic combat babe it was a big disappointment because we wanted her to be more. She's not losing anything, she just unfortunately never had those things we all attributed to her. A wasted opportunity.
That said, it's ok to kick ass and still be a bombshell - just take Bayonetta as an example.
JimB said:
And my point is I disagree, for the reasons I have listed.
Are you referring to the reasons that I argued against in my first post, and that you never addressed in an way other than repeating yourself? Ok then, moving on.
JimB said:
There seems to be an implication that the only way Samus can improve herself and/or compete in this tournament is with rocket shoes. That seems like a really weird presumption to me, but fine, whatever, let's run with it and say rocket shoes are the only way. For Samus to choosethose particular rocket shoes is baffling.
Sure.
JimB said:
I find it kind of hilarious that you accuse me of showing ignorance in the very same breath that you repeat a complaint someone else has already aimed at me and that I already responded to. I get that you're eager to insult me, NoeL, but please consider not letting that eagerness compromise your diligence.
I don't read the other posts in the thread so apologies if I missed that. Irony aside, that doesn't change the fact you made a statement that at least had the appearance of ignorance.
JimB said:
Why? Why can't a woman look sexy if she wants to? To use my above example, do you look at Bayonetta and think "God, I can't believe she sacrificed her integrity like that."? I know Samus has been drawn slightly more conservative in past years and there's a bit of Flanderisation going on there but she's always (outside of Nintendo Power) been a sex symbol. The Power Suit hides that so as not to let it detract from the core of the game but she's always been a sexy girl underneath. It's a little disappointing because she could have been more, but it's stupid to raise the sexism flag
now (or rather, it's stupid to act like the the heels add something that wasn't already there).
JimB said:
Samus Aran is a science fiction character. If you want to claim that nothing needs to make sense for fantasy characters, then fine, whatever, the whole point of fantasy is that you can just say "wizards did it" as an excuse for any stupid bullshit you want to. Science fiction is held to at least a pretense of rational sense.
Calling Metroid "science fiction" is debatable (space setting =/= science fiction). Granted some of the later games try to have more of a grounding in reality but the morph ball, screw attack, finding one-of-a-kind-power-suit-compatible items scattered across an alien planet make no more sense than being able to run in heels -
especially when they're ROCKET heels. She doesn't even
need to run in them! I just find this argument ridiculous to the point of absurdity: of all the fantastic shit that gets hand-waved away as video game logic both in Smash Bros. AND Metroid people have a hard time believing Samus
couldn't have exceptional balance, or that the shoes themselves are able to stabalise the wearer? This is when people need to take a step back and ask themselves if the practicality of the heels in this setting
really matters.
JimB said:
Are...are you sitting here and arguing that water's buoyancy and viscosity are such completely negligible effects that standing in water is completely and one hundred percent analogous to standing in open air?
/facepalm. Nothing more needs to be said.
JimB said:
Great, then she's running around in underwear for no reason. Fantastic.
Yes - in a game with fitness trainers, medieval knights, fire-breathing turtles, pink blobs, electric mice... how could you possibly find this MORE absurd than anything else going on?
JimB said:
Jesus Christ, dude. I get that you're pissed off at me for disagreeing with you about shoes, but if all you want is to suggest that I'm too mentally defective to tell that two different characters are two different characters, please let me know so I can get out of this bad-faith conversation right now.
I'm not pissed off at you for disagreeing. I love when people disagree. If I'm pissed off at you it's with your ignorance and/or poorly argued points. You're trying to complain about a character wearing shoes that don't fit in their suit, despite the face that character
never wears those shoes inside their suit. What even?