Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Clothing, ratings, and immersion: am I being weird?

Hi folks... not an in depth analysis thread or discussion break down today. Something a bit more conversational, with a question to the community.

So, where I am (Australia), this game is almost certainly going to finalise with an adult rating. We have sexual comentary, visible sexual activity on screen, nudity, etc., and while I disagree that sexual content should be rated more harshly than the literal bloody violence that games like this also contain, the world is what it is and ratings boards rate things the way they do - sex, *especially* non-hetero-normative sex - will get your game adult rated far faster than almost any amount of violence torture and gore, for whatever reason... This is beside the point, but it's a background to the question.

In the game, our character models have fully rendered upper bodies. We can shot these off on male characters, but not on female character; it's a sign that the game designers are treating female nipples/breasts as innately sexual in nature, but not males; this is pretty normal, even if I don't agree with it. They are happy to show these assets off specifically in the sexual scenes, but at no other time.

What we don't have is fully detailed lower bodies - by which, yes, I'm referring to the genital situation. In a game that is already going as far as it is, this strikes me as feeling, to be honest, odd. Or, if not odd, then a challenge for my immersion.

I feel, quite strongly, as it turns out, that if the game is already going as far as it is, there isn't any reason for our characters to be only half-detailed, upper but not lower. I'd like options for better looking or better fitting undergarments, and the ability to choose them; I'd like for our models to be complete, since we're already past the rating spike... Hells I'd like the option (and optionally there; players need not look at it if they don't want to. You could even have a ratings switch all the way form explicit, to fade out, to young-teen-friendly) to choose your personal grooming...

This isn't a pervy or a sexual thing, to my mind - it's a thing of character investment and immersion, because I'm left feeling like giving fully detailed and modeled breasts and nipples, specifically for showing off in sex scenes, but at no other time, *is* pervy in a way that just plain having complete models, all over, wouldn't be - it speaks about design focus and intent, in a way that a more thoroughly complete model wouldn't.

I feel as though, this is already a mature game for mature adults, and it will have a rating to say so - going halfway feels off, and a little bit demeaning, I suppose... having one half draws more attention to not having the other, and it makes the lack all the more visible, to me...

So, the question I have is... Am I being weird here? It feels rational and sensible to me, and it's not motivated by perviness or a desire for a lewder game - not at all.... but what do others here think?

What are the situations in which you will have a chance to look at your genitals? There are no clothes options that reveal genitals, sex scenes don't have the angles from which you could see them. You want to see a fully nude model when you take all equipment off? Because nothing else comes to mind. Also that doesn't exactly benefit immersion as I would still expect characters to have underwear too. Or are you asking if Larian could add angles during sex scenes from which you could see genitals?

It's hard to explain, exactly...

It's not about seeing, necessarily, so much as it's about knowing. Have you never gone out for the day in a cute set of lingerie, and been just that little bit buoyed up by the knowledge of it? You don't see it, no-one else sees it - but you know, and that's what matters. It's *kinda* like that, sorta... but not quite the same.

Hmm... It's also like - the sex sequences are explicitly and obviously choreographed to avoid showing what isn't there, not even for a moment - and it shows, and it's obvious, and it detracts from the experience. If the models were fully detailed, choreography for sequences could relax more, without being obviously designed around not showing those areas - it still *wouldn't*, for the most part, most likely, but if there were an occasional glimpse it would feel more authentic...

It's not an easy thing to explain, I don't think, at least not for me, but I figured I'd give it a shot and see what other opinions were.

OK, so as baseline you want the assets to just be in the game so that you can be rest assured that the characters are not Barbie and Ken dolls, even if you can't confirm it in the actual game due to never having a chance to see said assets.

But ideally you want sex scenes to be adjusted so you can get a glimpse here and there for immersion.

What do I think? Why the hell not?

Breasts are a secondary sexual characteristic akin to facial hair. If they want to specifically censor breasts, they should have to censor beards. Force Elminster to hide his shame!

Debatable, from a rational point of view, as functional breasts that can produce milk are crucial for the survival of a young child, and as such crucial for reproduction, unlike beards, as there is nothing else the child can eat other than mothers milk. Ofc I am talking about the natural order of things, nowadays we can synthesize artificial solution in the lab.

Gith come from eggs, so they wouldn't have any mammal stuff anyway. So I dont think we can do discussions of biology in BG3 as WotC didn't when they were making the setting?
The awkward, random mass propositioning of the PC at the party scene kind of sends a message that Larian are going for the Bioware we're a serious RPG with grown up sex scenes, so its probably about marketing and western media language and so, its demeaning and for male consumption because that's how the media it's trying to imitate/borrowing language from is?
I feel genitals being in a game, usually moves it from, look mature themes to look a joke, as that's generally the reaction it gets, see the mess with cyberpunk for a recent example and really, if you want equality and desexualising womens bodies more than men, sex scenes in RPGs aren't really a place to do it? Like they could put non-sexual nudity in the game to balance it out maybe but putting more in, tends to just make the game the butt of jokes (inquisition, ME, witcher, etc) than make them good reputation.

On Beards though, when I next GM I'm going to declare that dwarf babies get their nutrition from eating their parents beards, so dwarves having big beards is a way of showing off how well they could provide for future dwarflings in a birds building nests to win mates manner. I know it's not what anyone said but it's what I took from Kadajkos comment.

Sex is NSFW, underwear garments is SFW. People in general I'd say, don't want to have to manually make their gameplay SFW. What it appears you want is a mod that will make the norm vise versa. Which is fine if thats your taste but I dont think thats a good movie from a company makerting pov.

I don't even know why they have excessive blood and nudity to earn the M rating. They could have easily toned it down and made it suitable for a broader audience. PG-13 movies make more money because they don't restrict their audience like R rated movies. Seems games these days want to be more edgier?

My take on non-essentials is, if it doesn't seem like it will enhance the game in some meaningful way, resources can be used elsewhere to improve or polish other systems. I just don't think genitalia is necessary.

Happenstance. All mammals have nipples; only humans have significant breasts. Most likely they replaced the butt as a visual stimulus and unless they are actively engorged with milk there is no reason for them to look any different than male breasts other than that pure aesthetic that was sexually selected as we got upright. The fatty layers do not help nurse children, only the nipple that happens to be upon them. The thing we find so sexual is but just a secondary sexual characteristic.


Probably because there is some art behind it rather than a machine of pure capitalism without heart and soul.

To the hells with sexy thong armor !!

I want an off switch for clothing, just like for helms, and anatomically correct character models !!

My anatomically correct Ken and Barbie will be adventuring on Bachelor/Bachelorette Island !!

Evildoers, beware my blade - oops...left it in my other BVD's !!

There is nothing wrong with spellcasting from genetalia nor beating someone to death with it. Just not a DnD thing.

Didn't realize art with heart and soul requires explicit nudity and excess gore. You can have art and still make money. They aren't mutually exclusive.

It isn't? Then why is there a "Staff of Power" and a "Staff of the Magi" in D&D?

The moment you compromise that art in order to maximize profit it ceases to be art.

Scanlan Shorthalt would like a word with you...

*Ahem*

Sex is NSFW, underwear garments is SFW. People in general I'd say, don't want to have to manually make their gameplay SFW.[/quote]

And yet, the game is already NSFW; unless you think that the explicit sex scenes currently in the game wouldn't get you into trouble at your local palce of business? I was pondering the curiosity primarily because the game has, as far as I can see, already *crossed* the lines that game design usually holds back from for the sake of rating or audience sales... and if they've crossed that line already, then why not make things complete?

Personally, I find an intimate sequence that is comfortable in its choreography, more or less tastefully executed, but relaxed enough that occasional glimpses of the details may occur by happenstance - never the focus, just incidental to the focus of the scene, which ought to be the intimacy between the characters involved (said as distinct from the mechanics of the physical act) - to be far preferable and for more immersive to the experience, than a scene that is painfully and pains-takingly choreographed to avoid showing that particular detail at all costs, while still striving to show as much else as it can (as the current renders are).

That said... I certainly DO acknowledge those people pointing towards the fact that, traditionally, any games that HAVE included fully detailed models have invariably had that fact become something of a joking point... I wish that wasn't the case, and I don't think it NEEDS to be the case; it could be done maturely and tastefully... but getting an audience to accept that even if you do design it that way is a hurdle in itself.

It's not just about the intimate scenes, though again this comes pack to a very specific personal perspective: I mentally role play in games like this, and put my emotive head space into whatever charter I'm playing with, at least to some extent. I do 'unnecessary' things as part of that - such as taking off my armour before I sleep. I wish I could actually get under the cover, rather than lying on top of it. I would like to sit down and go through the motions of an evening meal with my companions, even if it didn't serve a mechanical purpose... so from that angle, having a specific set of universal underwear welded to my character's body at all times is a little off-putting...

I'm glad that some folks have at least found the question worthy of discussion.

First thing I thought of when reading this:



Edit: and the second (potentially mildly nsfw):

This just made me realise I want a mod where male Mages can cast some spells using their special wand, but it only has one charge per day ...


Yep. In for a penny, in for a pound. (And by pound I mean the currency.) Or, as Yoda says, "do, or do not". The current sex scene is indeed very suspiciously showing nothing, when sexes would and should have been seen. I'm certainly not advocating for close-ups of a penis inside a vagina, but a glimpse of hair or sexual organs would be more natural.

Not trying to argue with you but I am curious. Why stop before full blown porn? Like you said, do or do not.

One for the modders later I suspect. I kind of like the alluding to sex and sexuallity rather than full on in your face humping etc. More in game intimate chats with the other characters would also improve the immersion I think.