Crytek's Warface isn't even out of beta, but is already drawing controversy. The developer created sexualized female characters after listening to feedback from players in various regions, despite that men in the game are depicted much more realistically.
"[The players] were very comfortable with the fact we have these very realistic-looking men but they wanted the women to be not what we would think of as realistic at all," said Executive Producer Joshua Howard in a Wired article . "Up to and including running round in high heels which is just silly, right?"
While Crytek backed off of those more extreme designs, women still run around showing more skin than an on-field combatant should. The men don't reflect that design philosophy. The decision to design the women's outfits this way reflects "how we see how culturally the different regions approach the same game in different ways," Howard says.
You can't make a creative work with blatant gender misrepresentation anymore without scrutiny. And that's a good thing. It challenges artists to maneuver out of dishonest tropes and create something different. This is not different; this is the same kind of pandering design style that makes my eyes roll. Howard specifically mentions "authenticity," but this isn't authentic at all.
In our preview , executive producer Peter Holzapfel mentioned that Warface is designed to be a little exaggerated, at least in terms of gameplay. An argument could be made that this philosophy of exaggeration applies to the female character skins, but why can't it apply to the men as well? Why do the women have to singled out in this context? And if Crytek really wants a level of authenticity, then this design completely undermines that ambition.
