The real reason we don't get free male OCs

[GrandeRampel]

This is a random theory I came up with and wanted to share. Since book 2 we received a free OC to be the second main character of the story (after Alfster) for every book and they have always been female. This bias obviously brought many complaints, combined with the scarse number of male OCs in general.

But why do they refuse to give us what we ask for, even once? Is it because we are a vocal minority and for every complaint they receive 20 e-mails of praise for the new female main character each book? No.

Is it because they are afraid of shaking things up and so they continue to make free female OCs because it's what worked before? No.

Is it because they have an hard-on for Kirit-EGHM Alfonse and they don't want another male main character that could steal some of his popularity? No.

Do they believe that a male OC can't sell a new book? Close, but not quite.

I think the actual problem isn't that they think a male OC can't sell the new book. They think a male OC can't sell the game.

What do I mean? Well a gacha game is always seeking out new players, so let's assume that they can't attract new players on name recognition alone because every single fan of Fire Emblem already tried the game. How do they attract new players, then? Say, what do people look at to judge a book? The cover. And what's on the cover (app icon) of FEH? The free OC who is always a cute girl. And there lies the problem. Since the beginning we always had a cute girl on the cover to represent this game and tell people: "hey you can collect cute girls in this app! Download now!"

(Now that I think of it, could the fact we can't collect the OG cute girl Veronica be considered false advertising?).

So that's the problem, the damn app icon. As stupid and shallow a reason as it may sound it makes more sense than them hating males/not believing males can sell. Because if they thought that, than why did they make Muspell male? They could have gotten away with all the gods of Zenith being women (including Alfador lol) but they didn't go for it.

So does this mean we are doomed to never get a free male because he can't properly advertize a Waifu-game? Not really, they just have to realize they are not obligated to make the free OC the face of the app every time. For example, imagine a book that concludes the Embla subplot. They could give us Bruno as the free unit and use Veronica as the app icon again. They could give us a male OC for the final book vs Alfador and use Thorr and Loki as the icon.

So in conclusion they can give us a free male OC as long as they stop for two seconds to think of a reason why a cute female OC is the actual face of the book (say IS, wouldn't it be cool to have Sharena be the face of the app for a year? She is very cute).

 

 

Another solution would be to make a free OC who is just this world's Lucius. They can get away with using him as the face of the game.

[Dark Holy Elf]

If it's just the icon... I dunno. I think it would easily be possible for them to introduce a free male OC while still making the icon a woman who is prominent from the same book. I don't have trouble imagining an alternate reality where Fjorm was male and the icon was Laevatein instead, for instance.

11 minutes ago, GrandeRampel said:

Is it because they are afraid of shaking things up and so they continue to make free female OCs because it's what worked before? No.

I think this is a bit more the case than you. It's my experience that games - specifically Japanese games since I'm more familiar with those - often do fall into arbitrary patterns of doing what they did before, either because it's safe or because of some obsessive-compulsive pattern following by the devs (it's hard to tell how much is column A and how much is column B). Consider mainline Pokemon always opening with a choice between a grass, water, or fire starter. Or Fire Emblem starring a sword-using young man for its first seven games (and going back to that very often since, even with its spinoffs).

[Jotari]

Probably has something to do with it alright, but I'd say the other points are definitely considered too. Though we've been going for years now with cute female app icons, maybe it's worth a try to target a new audience and give us a toned Hawkeye styled character for the next book! Just like the number of people who are already fans of Fire Emblem is an exhausted market, the number of people who will download an app purely because of a cute face will eventually become a tapped market too

[FailWood]

That's waifu culture for you, and I fucking hate it.  Not all men are pigs who forfeit themselves to women on a daily basis, but unfortunately it's those who are that're the big spenders.  Until that changes, the balance will be forever skewed in women's favor.

...I've said enough on the whole men vs women topic as it is.  It's foolish to get my hopes up, and to try to have people see how fucked up it is.

[XRay]

56 minutes ago, GrandeRampel said:

But why do they refuse to give us what we ask for, even once? Is it because we are a vocal minority and for every complaint they receive 20 e-mails of praise for the new female main character each book? No.

I do not think most players honestly care about gender ratios, game representation ratios, etc.

1 hour ago, GrandeRampel said:

Is it because they are afraid of shaking things up and so they continue to make free female OCs because it's what worked before? No.

I think this is the most plausible reason. Businesses have very little incentive to change things unless it impacts their profits, and even then, sometimes corporate inertia will be so resistant to change they would sometimes rather lose profits and even go out of business than change. For example, it took them a stupidly long time just to make Arena bearable despite a huge amount of people complaining about it. For them to change, they probably need to recieve extremely negative feedback on the scale of Relay Defense where everyone is sending them hate mail.

37 minutes ago, FailWood said:

That's waifu culture for you, and I fucking hate it.  Not all men are pigs who forfeit themselves to women on a daily basis, but unfortunately it's those who are that're the big spenders.  Until that changes, the balance will be forever skewed in women's favor.

...I've said enough on the whole men vs women topic as it is.  It's foolish to get my hopes up, and to try to have people see how fucked up it is.

Hating on horny gamers because the games show sexuality is like hating on people who drink because restaurants serve alcohol. Hating people just because they do not share the same puritanical values as you is a bit excessive in my opinion, and this culture of prudishness is not exactly healthy either and these antagonistic attitudes in real life make people miserable too.

[FailWood]

1 hour ago, XRay said:

Hating on horny gamers because the games show sexuality is like hating on people who drink because restaurants serve alcohol.

You do realize I'm talking about what came from those behaviors, rather then the behaviors themselves, right?

1 hour ago, XRay said:

Hating people just because they do not share the same puritanical values as you is a bit excessive in my opinion, and this culture of prudishness is not exactly healthy either and these antagonistic attitudes in real life make people miserable too.

Saying I hate people for not sharing my values is not accurate, and I don't know where this "culture of prudishness" is currently going on, but it ain't here.

I think that's the first time I've been called antagonistic for not succumbing to horniness.  What is this world coming to?

[eclipse]

Let's see if this holds true for the gacha games I play.  My app icons feature:

Male - 3
Female - 3
Other - 1

Of the ones with female app icons, two of them have all-female casts.  Either my taste in games is absolutely amazing, or y'all need to play games that cater to gender equality instead of being miserable in Heroes.  Of my games, the one with the heaviest fanservice, by far, is one with a male icon.  My data may be horribly limited, but it shows that if you look for games that cater to your passions, you'll find them.

[Jotari]

6 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Let's see if this holds true for the gacha games I play.  My app icons feature:

Male - 3
Female - 3
Other - 1

Of the ones with female app icons, two of them have all-female casts.  Either my taste in games is absolutely amazing, or y'all need to play games that cater to gender equality instead of being miserable in Heroes.  Of my games, the one with the heaviest fanservice, by far, is one with a male icon.  My data may be horribly limited, but it shows that if you look for games that cater to your passions, you'll find them.

Not sure I can say anyone who plays seven different gatcha games has amazing taste 0.o

[eclipse]

1 minute ago, Jotari said:

Not sure I can say anyone who plays seven different gatcha games has amazing taste 0.o

That's perfectly fair~!  But it's a reminder that the gacha world is huge, so complaining about something in one game over and over makes me wonder why they do that to themselves.  There's a reason why I refuse to play Brave Exvius, despite my love of Final Fantasy!

[Othin]

3 minutes ago, eclipse said:

That's perfectly fair~!  But it's a reminder that the gacha world is huge, so complaining about something in one game over and over makes me wonder why they do that to themselves.  There's a reason why I refuse to play Brave Exvius, despite my love of Final Fantasy!

Personally, I play Heroes because I love its whole big FE crossover deal. So other games can't really compete with that, but a version of Heroes more willing to add male characters could have a more thorough representation of the FE cast.

That said, for that reason, I also don't care much about the gender of OCs.

[eclipse]

8 minutes ago, Othin said:

Personally, I play Heroes because I love its whole big FE crossover deal. So other games can't really compete with that, but a version of Heroes more willing to add male characters could have a more thorough representation of the FE cast.

That said, for that reason, I also don't care much about the gender of OCs.

And that's also fair!  I'm in it for the FE aspect as well.  However, there's certain people who would rather complain about gender ratios, which tells me that they place more emphasis on that.  Hence why I think it would be far more productive to find a game that does a better job of representing that than whining about it on some forum.  Life's way too short to spend on gacha games that aren't fun!

[Sunwoo]

6 minutes ago, Othin said:

Personally, I play Heroes because I love its whole big FE crossover deal. So other games can't really compete with that, but a version of Heroes more willing to add male characters could have a more thorough representation of the FE cast.

I second this. The only reason I'm playing Heroes is because it's supposed to be a game that brings together all the FE characters from previous (and current) games. Which is why I'm less than thrilled with the deluge of OCs who are rarely anywhere near as fleshed out as characters from non-Heroes games, and the overrepresentation of female characters making it far more likely that any male character I like either gets screwed over as a unit or is outright delayed (or never added).

My reasons for having issues with the gender split of the OCs is actually kind of not an FE issue. It's a general "how I view society and human beings' attitudes towards other people" issue, so I won't get into that here.

[Ottservia]

39 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Let's see if this holds true for the gacha games I play.  My app icons feature:

Male - 3
Female - 3
Other - 1

Of the ones with female app icons, two of them have all-female casts.  Either my taste in games is absolutely amazing, or y'all need to play games that cater to gender equality instead of being miserable in Heroes.  Of my games, the one with the heaviest fanservice, by far, is one with a male icon.  My data may be horribly limited, but it shows that if you look for games that cater to your passions, you'll find them.

I mean it also heavily depends on the Gacha’s target demographic in regards to the kind of fanservice and gender ratio. Gacha games are typically made for a Japanese Otaku audience typically of the seinen or josei variety the only exception I know of being pokemon masters. A gacha oriented toward make Otaku will likely market itself with cute anime girls and badass or normal male protagonists. If it’s a gach made for female Otaku(and yes they do exist in large enough quantities) you’ll get more male characters of varying archetypes typically found in shoujo anime/manga and otome games. You won’t see many female characters in a game like Obey me for instance. Now some Gachas do target a mix of demographics but that’s generally the pattern I see from my knowledge of this types of media and Otaku culture as a whole.

[eclipse]

4 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

I mean it also heavily depends on the Gacha’s target demographic in regards to the kind of fanservice and gender ratio. Gacha games are typically made for a Japanese Otaku audience typically of the seinen or josei variety the only exception I know of being pokemon masters. A gacha oriented toward make Otaku will likely market itself with cute anime girls and badass or normal male protagonists. If it’s a gach made for female Otaku(and yes they do exist in large enough quantities) you’ll get more male characters of varying archetypes typically found in shoujo anime/manga and otome games. You won’t see many female characters in a game like Obey me for instance. Now some Gachas do target a mix of demographics but that’s generally the pattern I see from my knowledge of this types of media and Otaku culture as a whole.

Good point.  Target audience for the games with the male avatars are people who are familiar with the series - which definitely includes otaku (with Final Fantasy being the "least otaku", if you will).  I don't think I need to outline who the all-girl games target.  Heroes is looking for money, full stop, which would explain why weapons went from "Special cooldown -1" to "insert essay here", never mind the million alts.  The lone "other" is aimed at kids.

[Ottservia]

6 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Good point.  Target audience for the games with the male avatars are people who are familiar with the series - which definitely includes otaku (with Final Fantasy being the "least otaku", if you will).  I don't think I need to outline who the all-girl games target.  Heroes is looking for money, full stop, which would explain why weapons went from "Special cooldown -1" to "insert essay here", never mind the million alts.  The lone "other" is aimed at kids.

Well it’s also because Final Fantasy has always done better in the west compared to Japan so it would inevitably be “less anime” in how it markets itself. It’s also worth considering that the reason Gachas took off at all is because of how the Japanese market values portable gaming because it gives them something to do on their commute to school or work. Not many people drive cars in japan especially in the big cities but that’s a tangent for another time.

[indigoasis]

I'm sure the game could use more dudes (where is Boyd), but as it stands, it's a game made to make money, so they're going to use the best possible tactics to ensure they can make the highest profit possible, even if those practices are inherently predatory.

I've never really had many issues with male vs. female representation all that much since I enjoy building units more than anything else in the game, but maybe that's just me.

7 hours ago, GrandeRampel said:

(Now that I think of it, could the fact we can't collect the OG cute girl Veronica be considered false advertising?).

Nah, she just straight up told us she would never join us in Book I, which is why OG!Veronica has never been playable. There are still her variants to summon, so technically it's not false advertising. Technically.

[eclipse]

1 minute ago, Ottservia said:

Well it’s also because Final Fantasy has always done better in the west compared to Japan so it would inevitably be “less anime” in how it markets itself.

The game I have in mind was very much marketed to the Japanese audience (hello there Type-0 saturation), but due to the way they did their gacha, it wound up being a very solid game regardless.  Heroes was a global release, and I feel like they're going after people who are after girls and/or people who want to have the most broken units available (hence the ridiculous weapon descriptions).

[Ice Dragon]

8 hours ago, GrandeRampel said:

What do I mean? Well a gacha game is always seeking out new players, so let's assume that they can't attract new players on name recognition alone because every single fan of Fire Emblem already tried the game. How do they attract new players, then? Say, what do people look at to judge a book? The cover. And what's on the cover (app icon) of FEH? The free OC who is always a cute girl. And there lies the problem. Since the beginning we always had a cute girl on the cover to represent this game and tell people: "hey you can collect cute girls in this app! Download now!"

Meanwhile, the current icon is about as androgynous as it gets.

[XRay]

19 minutes ago, FailWood said:

You do realize I'm talking about what came from those behaviors, rather then the behaviors themselves, right?

Sex offenders are horny and drunk drivers are drunk, but not every horny person sexually harasses people and not every drunk person drives. I just do not think Loki titillating Kiran is anything that deserves hating on horny gamers. Some horny gamers are assholes, but the vast majority are not and they are content with dreams, fantasies, and whatever Plumeria sends their way.

15 minutes ago, FailWood said:

I think that's the first time I've been called antagonistic for not succumbing to horniness.  What is this world coming to?

It is the holier-than-thou attitude and talking down on people as if they are filthy or untouchable. Antagonizing people just feels a bit much in my opinion.

30 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Let's see if this holds true for the gacha games I play.  My app icons feature:

Male - 3
Female - 3
Other - 1

Of the ones with female app icons, two of them have all-female casts.  Either my taste in games is absolutely amazing, or y'all need to play games that cater to gender equality instead of being miserable in Heroes.  Of my games, the one with the heaviest fanservice, by far, is one with a male icon.  My data may be horribly limited, but it shows that if you look for games that cater to your passions, you'll find them.

My icons are all female. I feel I am way too picky with the aesthetics of the gacha games I play. Besides Heroes, the only gachas I have tried have an exclusively female cast. My thought process is that in case I spend money on them, if I have to put up with pitybreakers, I rather my pitybreakers be pretty waifus. I think the reason why I do not mind being pitybroken by husbandos in Heroes is because I know them and there is actually decent gameplay in Heroes.

My only issue with waifu collection games is that 99% of them are really mindnumbling boorrriiiinnnnngggggg. Despite loving the art style and cute waifus, I uninstalled Valkyrie Chronicles after about a week or so cause the gameplay was boring, and going through the story feels like a complete waste of time. Like can you imagine what would happen to Heroes if our Story Mode is as dry and pain-in-the-ass as Arena Assault? I do not think Heroes would have lasted a year. Divine Armaments and Darklord Legends are pretty boring too, but they feel less like a chore so I stuck with them a bit longer for a few months. I have also tried a few spicier gachas not avaiable on Google Play, but their gameplay is not any better. There was a spicy game where I actually enjoyed the gameplay, but the game shut down not long after I joined.

[eclipse]

2 minutes ago, XRay said:

My icons are all female. I feel I am way too picky with the aesthetics of the gacha games I play. Besides Heroes, the only gachas I have tried have an exclusively female cast. My thought process is that in case I spend money on them, if I have to put up with pitybreakers, I rather my pitybreakers be pretty waifus. I think the reason why I do not mind being pitybroken by husbandos in Heroes is because I know them and there is actually decent gameplay in Heroes.

My only issue with waifu collection games is that 99% of them are really mindnumbling boorrriiiinnnnngggggg. Despite loving the art style and cute waifus, I uninstalled Valkyrie Chronicles after about a week or so cause the gameplay was boring, and going through the story feels like a complete waste of time. Like can you imagine what would happen to Heroes if our Story Mode is as dry and pain-in-the-ass as Arena Assault? I do not think Heroes would have lasted a year. Divine Armaments and Darklord Legends are pretty boring too, but they feel less like a chore so I stuck with them a bit longer for a few months. I have also tried a few spicier gachas not avaiable on Google Play, but their gameplay is not any better. There was a spicy game where I actually enjoyed the gameplay, but the game shut down not long after I joined.

I don't know what your stance on Touhou is, but the playable cast is exclusively female.  The current event involves a lot of traditional Japanese cooking.  I don't know what genius turned a bullet hell into a RPG, but here we are.  The grinding can be tedious, but there's two different Auto modes to get through that.  The really hard battles require planning your team out, and taking advantage of the in-game mechanics.  Event stories are mostly silly, but the main story's, well, interesting (it blows Heroes books out of the water, and they juggle a much bigger cast).  I'm having fun, at least!

tl;dr - There's a LOT of different games out there.  I'm really picky about who makes my games and what franchise they're from, which is why I usually stick with what I play.

[Lightcosmo]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

hello there Type-0 saturation)

Hey now, as someone who favors Type-0, this is slanderous! Xd

[GrandeRampel]

4 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

Meanwhile, the current icon is about as androgynous as it gets.

LOL fair enough. I let myself be blinded by the fact I already got to know Reginn and learned what a cutie she is, and that prevented me from judging the icon on its own. But hey, maybe it means they are getting better about this, and a man as the face of the app isn't as unlikely as I thought. I still believe it will be a man that looks like a woman first.

[Othin]

Androgynous women, huh. This gives me a great idea for how to explain Heroes Reginn being a girl while mythological Reginn is a guy.

Could apply to other OCs, as well. Loki even has precedent!

[Jotari]

10 hours ago, eclipse said:

And that's also fair!  I'm in it for the FE aspect as well.  However, there's certain people who would rather complain about gender ratios, which tells me that they place more emphasis on that.  Hence why I think it would be far more productive to find a game that does a better job of representing that than whining about it on some forum.  Life's way too short to spend on gacha games that aren't fun!

Indeed, why complain about gender ratios when you can do the far more Fire Embly thing of complaining about stat lines and endless units of the same class XD But that being said, I think most of us here are here fore the Fire Emblem aspect, but you can still have a preference when it comes to gender ratios (personally I don't really). If gender ratios are paramount then I really question someone's priorities, but just because they're not paramount, also doesn't mean they're not important.

[Mysterique Sign]

The reason the the free OCs of each Book are female is so there's a male and female main character, Alfonse is consistent but his female counterpart changes in each Book. If the free OC was male there'd be two male leads and no female lead