this post was submitted on 01 Jun 2025
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Garnet/Dagger almost has the same exact hair as Tifa for most of the game

spoiler

In all fairness, all three had very different personalities and even classes

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[–] Z_Poster365@hexbear.net 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

East Asian women generally have dark hair and brown eyes. Not sure why it would be surprising that a Japanese game would portray Asian women as the love interests. I find it a lot better than the modern anime trope of a harem of copy-paste women with different bright hair colors like blue, green, red, yellow, etc.

It's pretty whack that anime women often can be accurately described as one of three personality tropes like tsundere. It really feels like a "Make your own barbie doll" for Incels and they get to pick its factory settings personality and hair color to personalize it.

Have I mentioned I generally don't like anime?

[–] doublepepperoni@hexbear.net 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

I just think it's interesting that a series that has a huge variety of character designs put characters with very similar vibes in the same exact role three times in a row.

Also I'm not sure how many FF characters are meant to be explicitly ethnically Japanese or Asian outside of maybe Yuffie, though. Race is kind of nebulous in anime and FF* in general so it's hard to tell

spoiler*Unless it's Barrett in which case 90's Square localisers made sure you knew he was black

[–] anarchoilluminati@hexbear.net 3 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

That's really true and a good point about race being nebulous in Final Fantasy but I personally always assumed everyone was Asian, with some notable examples like Barrett or Cid.

So I also always thought this made sense for them to depict love interests with commonly East Asian characteristics. Of course, Asia is massive and includes people with blue eyes, and so on, but I think this is very based.

As Z_Poster365 said, it's way better than the unrealistic, cartoonist way anime depicts Asian women. Obviously, neither is real. One is a video game and one is a cartoon of sorts so they have fantastical liberties I don't think should be denied them but this is great. The less men have some fantastical and unrealistic expectations of women the better. I mean, Tifa already is a bit of an unrealistic expectation in, uh, certain aspects, but I think this is generally a good way to depict Asian women who are love interests in a game mostly targeting and set within an Asian market.

Better they did this than pander to Western love interest tropes which for so long were necessarily some White, blue-eyed, blonde. I'd take a Rinoa over Trish (DMC) in a game any day.

[–] doublepepperoni@hexbear.net 2 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

I personally always assumed everyone was Asian, with some notable examples like Barrett or Cid.

How come Cid is white but Cloud and Aerith are Asian??? monke-beepboop

As Z_Poster365 said, it's way better than the unrealistic, cartoonist way anime depicts Asian women. Obviously, neither is real. One is a video game and one is a cartoon of sorts so they have fantastical liberties I don't think should be denied them but this is great. The less men have some fantastical and unrealistic expectations of women the better. I mean, Tifa already is a bit of an unrealistic expectation in, uh, certain aspects, but I think this is generally a good way to depict Asian women who are love interests in a game mostly targeting and set within an Asian market.

Better they did this than pander to Western love interest tropes which for so long were necessarily some White, blue-eyed, blonde. I'd take a Rinoa over Trish (DMC) in a game any day.

I'm still not convinced Tifa, Rinoa or Garnet/Dagger/Sarah is supposed to look Japanese. Yuna from FFX reads as much more Japanese-coded to me because of her name but mostly because she's dressed like (and sort of is) a shrine maiden. She also looks very different from her immediate predecessors with shorter, lighter-coloured hair and heterochromic blue/green eyes.

[–] anarchoilluminati@hexbear.net 1 points 10 hours ago

How come Cid is white but Cloud and Aerith are Asian??? monke-beepboop

He was clearly supposed to be White because they made him such a loud, rude, arrogant bastard.

I'm still not convinced Tifa, Rinoa or Garnet/Dagger/Sarah is supposed to look Japanese. Yuna from FFX reads as much more Japanese-coded to me because of her name but mostly because she's dressed like (and sort of is) a shrine maiden. She also looks very different from her immediate predecessors with shorter, lighter-coloured hair and heterochromic blue/green eyes.

Yuna is definitely more Japanese-coded, I agree about that, especially with the clothes. I don't know but I think pre-X they just didn't have the hardware to make them look more detailed so they just end up looking kinda ambiguous. Rinoa definitely looks the most like a real, normal Asian woman to me though, and she's coincidentally the one of the three I predominantly crush on but mainly because I go with Aerith in the Aerith/Tifa debate, but I still think they are all supposed to be Asian. it-is-known

[–] TheSpectreOfGay@hexbear.net 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

NOOO I DONT WANNA BE A LOVE INTEREST

[–] doublepepperoni@hexbear.net 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A spiky-haired young man with a mysterious past is already on his way to your location

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 8 points 1 day ago

And I crushed on all of them

[–] LaGG_3@hexbear.net 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I think I prefer FF7 and FF9 a lot more, but Eyes on Me is a great song

[–] doublepepperoni@hexbear.net 5 points 1 day ago

The music is the best part about FF8