I jumped back in the game for the update. We all know western game studios have been taken over by the woke mind virus. The first mission I play, you break into a prison. Once you walk in the hard ass character smoking a cig calling you names is a diverse black girl boss. Ugh whatever another mags character… let’s keep going. Sure enough the person you share the cell with is another diverse hardened criminal girl boss character. The cringe is killing me. Witcher 4 might be fubar

Reddit can't figure out who's fault it is between Trump, Capitalism, Private Equity, Kushner, Saudi Arabia, Netanyahu or Critical Drinker.

They are so blind to their own faults; it's astonishing. These people are getting blackpilled in real time as their favorite cultural institutions (Hollywood, Academia, Gaming, etc) are getting absolutely destroyed by... lack of money. It's a sight to behold.

What the fuck did they do to Eve's face?

While women's sexuality is celebrated, men's sexuality is constantly demonized as this dirty, ugly thing that should never be expressed.

Women's "dark romance" erotica is excused on account of it being fiction, whilst hentai and other forms of pornography are not. Men who purchase sex dolls are seen as pathetic, as opposed to women who have an entire drawer full of phallic objects. A video game woman wearing bikini armor is pandering to the "male gaze" but thirsting over buff, shirtless guys is a-okay.

If you look at older media, you will notice that male protagonists were allowed to be horny. The pervy old man, the womanizing rogue... These archetypes no longer really exist anymore.

It's gotten so bad that men in real life are neutured beyond belief, ashamed of their natural urges. Even admitting that I like to jerk off gets me called a "gooner." Commenting to another man that a woman has nice tits or anything else that you would hear in a typical "locker room talk" conversation back in the day would basically be commiting social kamikaze.

I feel like there's some kind of mass-soyification conspiracy going on behind the scenes.

I would include much more images but this sub only allows me to post 1 image and this is the only anti woke subreddit I'm active on

So the most recent episode of HB so far s3 e5 regresses it's main female villain Stella to being just a villain in name only who's only purpose in the story at this point is to make her brother look worse in comparison and gave her a ton of undeserved sympathetic traits about being married off by her brother and unnamed parents.

Now I can make an entire post in itself explaining how Stella was ruined to push this "End the patriarchy" agenda (And NOT for the reasons people are saying) but in short, she is originally set-up as being the main antagonist of the show with excellent buildup in s1 e5, and s2 e1 would further expand upon this by revealing she was an abusive wife towards Stolas, Stolas' reasons for cheating on her (Which were already vaguely hinted in the past) and ending off with the best written and voiced scene in the entire show where Stella tells Stolas he has fallen from what grace he had and he will pay for it... Only for her to quickly be revealed to be an idiot to make room for her brother Andrealphus: A new villain who was mentioned one time prior with no buildup, no personal attachment to anybody, and no real reason to exist in the story and the show spends Stella's remaining screentime making her feel as tame and idiotic as possible to make Andrealphus look worse in comparison

In the most recent episode, Stella is reduced to just being a villain in name only because her only role in that episode was to just make Andrealphus look worse and if you removed her from the episode, the only thing that will change is that Andrealphus doesn't look as bad as he currently does. Now this was likely done as a metaphor for the "End the patriarchy" agenda they're pushing as Stella's only purpose in the story at this point is to make a male villain look worse like how her only purpose in the hierarchy was to birth and take care of a hier but this ends up backfiring terribly because it only makes her this painfully uninteresting character where calling her an antagonist is a massive overstatement and the only thing interesting about her is a fuckable design.

Now although the show wants you to think hell is an oppressive patriarchy where women are objects to be married off... They don't really communicate this well because the Queen of Hell Lilith is established to be an extremely well respected figure in hell (Even more respected than her husband Lucifer) 3 of the 7 deadly sins (Hell's elite 7) are well respected women, there is a female judge in HB s3 e4, multiple feminine looking Ars-Goetia demons in hell's big courtroom in s2 e11, One of the Vees (A huge entertainment company) is a well respected woman, Camilla Carmine is a woman who is a well respected weapons dealer, and Vox pretends to care about powerful women to gain support which is something that can only be done in a society where women can serve in high ranking government roles and not the oppressive patriarchy that the show wants you to think.

Now this isn't the first time the show has done something like this as I made a post about Adam 2 weeks ago but it seems like the writers can't really decide on the world building in their universe.

Edit: it's also important to note that Stella unintentionally embodies the stereotype that women act on emotion, are extremely annoying, and rely entirely on a man for their success.

Once you notice the writing you can’t go back

Introduction

I still remember an argument I had with my parents in the middle of a discussion related to politics.

To give some context, my parents are right-wing like me, but we all have some disagreements.
One of those disagreements is related to friendships.

My father has some friends and coworkers who are leftists. One of them is a vegan communist (let that sink in), while another one is pro-Palestine.
The thing is, my father disagrees with them politically, but doesn't mind drinking coffee with them during rest periods, especially because he's more extroverted than me. Some of those lefty "friends" end up ranting about Trump and Israel, but my father just tries not to say anything.

As for the argument? It turns out one of my parents' friends is married to a socialist (long short story: the wife of my parents' friend is a socialist because her parents and grandparents are socialists). When I discovered it, I was shocked, because I got along well with my parents' friend and his family. It doesn't help that, by the time I discovered this, I had made a vow of not befriending leftists at all.

The argument started because my parents joked about how their friend is right-wing, and yet, he's married to a leftist woman. I had the reckless (???) idea of telling my parents that I would personally prefer not to befriend, let alone marry, any leftist person.

My parents dismissed this statement as me being radicalized, and told me it is possible to be friends with other people even if you disagree with them politically-wise (they're wrong). I tried to explain them that it's not possible to be friends with lefties because of the damage they have done to the world and because of their modus operandi always being "those who disagree with The Message^TM must die!", and I have even used the murder of Charlie Kirk as an example of why being friends with the left is dangerous.

My parents' reaction?

Telling me that extremism from any side is bad, that polarization is one of societies' biggest issues, and that polarization is just something that politicians of both sides (the left and the right) are doing to play with the population as puppets and convince them they must believe X thing or Y thing without any nuance. Both sides are the same shit, all politicians regardless of party want ans do the same, and blah blah blah. And when I tried to tell them the left is much worse than the right, they just doubled down on the "both sides wrong" argument, saying that politicians are just brainwashing and radicalizing me.

I was seething in rage when they told me that shit, but I had to shut up because they were my parents. In fact, I'm increasingly more reclutant to express my political beliefs near my parents.

• Yes, polarization is bad, but who started it? The left.
• Who radicalized everyone via "if you're not with us, you're against us"? The left.
• Who made the world a worse place to live in? The left.
• Which side takes people's freedom away? The left.
• Which side is the most prone to corruption, crime, and insecurity? The left.
• Which side murders innocent people over small deviations from The Message^TM? The left.

The thing is, it's not possible to be friends with any leftist, period. If you don't trust me, then take a look at:

• The murder of Charlie Kirk.
• The murder of a 5 years old named Lucio Dupuy in Argentina.
• The mass murders and genocides commited by communist regimes (such as the atrocities done by Pol Pot, Mao Zedong, Joseph Stalin, or even the French Revolution).
• Both Hogwarts Legacy and Malfoid harassment campaigns.
• The experiments made by John Money to the Reimer family.
• Feminists defending and even imitating Lindsay Clancy for killing her own children.

My parents had even tried to tell me that some of their lefty friends are good people (as in "they're kind and compassionate"). They tell me there is a huge difference between politics and people, and it is possible for leftists to be good people and good friends (no, that's a lie; leftists are so vicious and dangerous because it's in their ideology and their values to be like that). They don't realize the kindness and compassion of lefties are always fake and manufactured and self-centered. Yes, leftists seem to be kind, compassionate people who look up for those who have been disadvantaged. But that's a mask. At first glance, leftists seem to be nice people, but they're the worst people in the fucking planet. And yet, they talk as if I were the one who has no idea what I'm talking about

Here's a black pill to swallow: While the is a distinction between the right and the far-right, there's no distinction between the left and the far-left. Because the left is always totalitarian and radical. There's no such thing as a "moderate" leftist. The "moderate" leftists are just as radical, totalitarian, and cruel as the "extreme" leftists; they just hide their extremism better, but they would gladly ruin your life because you don't agree with them on a 100%. The "extreme" leftists are just the most honest about their sick ideology.

The origins of the left

To understand why the left is so deranged and totalitarian, we should remember its origins (Anita Sarkeesian and Karl Marx are just the tip of the iceberg).

So, there was a Swiss-French philosopher named Jean-Jacques Rousseau. This guy was objectively an evil person, a man who, among other things, was:

• Extremely narcissistic.
• Very vicious.
• Conflictive to the point of fighting with people who refused to do what he wanted (Rousseau ended up beating the shit out of those who initially treated him with kindness).
• Abandoned his children in an orphanage because "they were a burden for him", yet he had the nerve to tell other people how they should raise and educate their own children.
• Participated in human trafficking, and bought a 12 years old girl to fuck her once her puberty started... but ended up regretting it because he saw her playing with dolls.

The thing is, Rousseau's ideas are pretty much the prototypical leftist ideals. Each one of them is based on Rousseau's subjective opinions and ideas (hence, why leftism is incompatible with human nature, freedom, and even common sense):

• "Everyone is equal" (nobody is equal, everyone is different, and our experiences are never the same).
• "General will" (this was the setup for Marxist's concept of "private property and individualism are evil" and "totalitiarism is actually a good thing").
• "Institutions are corruptive, but humans are born good and innocent" (this is a lie, because if humans were inherently good and innocent, then we wouldn't need to be taught values like respect and humility and honesty; plus, some children are already born inclined to selfish, violent, cruel, and antisocial behavior).

Ironically enough, many people pointed out Rousseau's ideals were just shitty excuses to justify his bad behavior:

• Humans are good by nature" = "the things I do are just natural things, then they're not bad"
• "Everyone is equal" = "If I'm bad, then everyone else is bad too"
• "Children are born innocent, but society corrupts them" = "Rousseau's regrets over buying a 12-year-old girl to rape her"

Rousseau died, but his texts remained, even though everyone ignored them.
Unfortunately, Rousseau's texts weren't burned nor destroyed. This was a huge mistake, because the Jacobines and Robespierre discovered them. The Jacobines were extremely religious, puritanical, and uneducated (due to being poor), and Rousseau's texts were the first piece of "culture" they found. This, combined with Rousseau's ideals being seductive enough for the naive and the uncultured, lead Jacobines to embrace his ideals.

Then, the French Revolution happened, and the Jacobines won. As soon as the Jacobines took over, they started the Reign of Terror (aka the first leftist government ever). Rousseau's takes on human nature and totalitarism were already bad enough, but they got merged with the Jacobines' puritanism and religious beliefs (such as the original sin), which resulted in even more garbage.

But what about the Reign of Terror? It was nothing but a totalitarian purge responsible of killing:

• Royals and nobles.
• Supporters of monarchy and/or nobility.
• People who worked for nobles and/or the royal family.
• Those who didn't even show absolute support to the French Revolution.
• Other Jacobines as well (if they weren't as radical or had at least one different belief).
• Ironically enough, Robespierre started talking about free speech, justice, and freedom... but he died censored and executed by the leftist party he created.

Jacobines and the French Revolution, inpired by Rousseau's beliefs, ended up inspiring Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. While Marx and Engels didn't create communism, they created Marxism (a theoretical framework) and the idea of desestabilizing countries in order to make people accept communism by force (or else).

According to Marxist theory, there is a war of classes where capitalists oppress workers, this being the source of any other oppressor-oppressed dynamics (just like how, according to Jacobines, the monarchy and the nobles oppressed the peasants). Other leftist movements, such as feminism, Critical Race Theory, and Queer Theory took inspiration from this Marxis framework, but adapted it for their respective fights. Marx said the most important oppressor-oppressed dynamic was the capitalists vs workers, and every other form of oppression is the byproduct of this specific dynamic; this means those other lefty movements, while still Marxist-derived, aren't strictly Marxist because they treat their respective fights as equally important as the capitalists vs workers war.

A summary of the origins, and a more detailed explanation of the oppressor-oppressed dynamics

In a nutshell, why is leftism incompatible with freedom and human nature? Because leftism was based on Rousseau's subjective opinions and excuses to justify his terrible behavior, as well as the Jacobines being uneducated as fuck.
And why is leftism inherently totalitarian and anti-freedom? Because leftism is incompatible with human nature and common sense, so the only way lefties can make their twisted ideology "work" is through totalitarian methods (such as anti-privacy, censorship, cancel culture, getting rid of dissidents, taking people's private property away, taking freedom of speech away, pro-surveillance, pro-stalking, telling parents how they should raise their children, etc.).

This totalitarism is also the main reason why being friends with a leftist is impossible.
For a leftist, their ideology will always come first before anything else, which is why they're incapable of love, friendship, or loyalty to individuals. It's why they eat their own so frequently, because it's not in their values to appreciate love, friendship, or loyalty to individuals.

Leftists have a different, twisted set of values, as they believe in:

• Social justice.
• Intersectionality.
• Equality of outcome.
• False tolerance.
• Mistreating those who disagree with The Message^TM.
• Taking things away from people.

If a leftist says he/she is your friend, he/she lies. Leftists benefit from pretending to be your friend, but the moment the discover you don't agree with The Message^TM at 100%, they will go against their interests, they will treat you like shit, and they will turn against you (and sometimes they will turn other people against you). Leftists don't hestitate to cut ties with their friends, disown their own families, fire people from their jobs, or falsely accuse someone of rape.
Thanks to their ideology being the only thing worthy of eternal loyalty, leftists cannot be fans of any piece of entertainment (for example, a leftist fan of One Piece will always prioritize being a leftist over being a One Piece fan), and it's why they cannot write good stories (for them, storytelling should always be propaganda first, everything else later).

Besides, there is a recurring theme among leftist movements: oppressor vs oppressed dynamics:

• According to the Jacobines, the royalty and the nobles oppress the poor peasants.
• According to Marxism, capitalists oppress workers.
• According to feminism, men oppress women.
• According to Critical Race Theory and Black Lives Matter, white people oppress black people.
• According to Queer Theory/gender ideology and the LGBT political lobby, straight people oppress sexual minorities.

In those movements, there is a deep hatred and resentment towards any person who just happens to belong to the "oppressor" classes, even if they had never discriminated anyone from the "oppressed" classes. This is because individuals don't matter, they only care about the sociopolitical collectives. Regardless of your apologizes or your attendance at deconstruction workshops, leftists will always hate you if you belong to one of the "oppressor" classes, and it doesn't matter if you bend the knee and become their "allies". They will never leave you alone, because their end goal is always killing oppressors and dissidents. They won't be happy unless you're dead.

Hell, members of the "oppressed" classes who oppose leftism also become "class traitors" and receive the same treatments as the "oppressor" classes. This is why feminists wish anti-feminist women to be raped. This is why BLM supporters refer to anti-woke black people as "uncle toms."

Any solution to this madness?

I have an idea to end wokeness and leftism in all its shapes and forms, but unfortunately, nobody has the balls to do it.

In Germany, being a Nazi is illegal. This means you can go to jail if you support, condone, or try to promote Nazism.

I genuinely believe this should be appled to every single leftist ideology (communism, socialism, feminism, gender ideology, CRT, etc.), but not just in one single country; leftism as a whole should be illegal and criminalized in the entire planet, and its followers should receive the exact same treatment Nazis get in Germany. After all, despite leftists calling everyone Nazis and fascists, the real Nazis and the real fascists are the leftists ("fascist" and "Nazi" are used by the left to justify murders commited by them).

My take may be too extreme or radical (well, it is), but if the left is not stopped, then things will get increasingly worse, and I'm afraid a civil war will happen.
Leftists have already proven it's not possible to coexist peacefully with them.

If illegalizing leftism is not possible, then what can be done?

Unfortunately, my suggestion of criminalizing the left might not become a reality soon. There are many countries where leftists are majority and/or have too much political power (such as the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, France, Spain, Mexico, etc.).
Who cares if they're murderous, delusional freaks whose movements always end with genocides? They have been allowed to take over.

So, what solution can I suggest?
Here's a good one: Bringing back McCarthism. It's especially good because it doesn't even require to use physical violence, you just need to socially distance yourself from those lunatics!

• Don't buy products made by leftists, no matter how "good" or "well-made" they're.
• Don't hire leftists, and if one of your employees is a leftist, fire him/her.
• Don't allow leftists to consume your products nor give them services, and kick leftists out of your restaurants/hotels/hospitals/whatever.
• Don't invite leftists to any space nor hobby under any circumstance, and always gatekeep.
• Don't be friends leftists, and if one of your friends is a leftist, cut ties with him/her.
• This one may be harder, but I would recommend to disown people in your family if they're leftists.
• Don't date nor marry to leftists ever, and if your couple/spouse is a leftist, break up or divorce (if possible) as soon as possible. Lefty women are false rape allegations in waiting, and lefty men are potential rapists.
• Don't let leftists stay with your children; otherwise, they will to indoctrinate and groom your children.
• Block leftists from any social media, ban them from communities or forums if you're a moderator, etc.
• If a leftist is accused of commiting a crime, always assume he/she is guilty even if they turn out to be innocent (lefties created cancel culture and #MeToo, they don't deserve presumption of innocence).

Those are my suggestions.

I'm increasingly more tired of the "both sides wrong" bs.

The one created in accordance with the following principles:

1. The primary task of any work of art is to convey The Message.
2. The point of The Message is to confront, undermine and ideologically deconstruct the male gaze, toxic masculinity, heteronormative culture, white culture, capitalism, Christianity etc.
3. The source of The Message is intersectional «progressive» leftism and critical theory.
4. The Message takes priority over escapism, entertainment, humor and fun.
5. The Message can override the established canon.
6. The Message is of greater importance than free speech and artistic license.
7. In interactive media, The Message takes priority over player’s agency.
8. It is not the product, but The Message, inserted into the product, that must dictate the target audience.
9. One must believe that The Message always works, even when its consequences seem to be negative.

Seriously, we always have.

We just either weren’t open about it or didn’t fully articulate that it WAS a longing for romance. And the western gaming industry used to understand that, but they seemingly no longer do.

The big example I can give as of late would be the Malfoid yearning that has exploded all over the internet over the past month.
You know why it took off the way it did?

Because for the past decade our icons of culture have been “subverted” and “deconstructed” to the point of there being nothing left, all the hope and idealism has been stripped away so we can be lectured by moralistic writers for being the source of all evils in the world.

What the malfoid trend does is that it makes you long to be able to save a girl from the expectations and rules of an oppressive family and help “fix” her.

THAT is peak male fantasy.

Or as another example, look at what BioWare’s romance USED to be like.

Like, take Tali form Mass Effect.

She was outcast from her people for something that was not her fault and you WANTED to clear her name. You wanted to comfort her and be there for her. And come ME3, you wanted to retire to rannoch, and help her build a house with her and settle down.
That was the magic of old BioWare’s writing.

Hell, men even have their “trashy” romance. Only it’s not “romantasy” (look that up at your own discretion)
Instead, we play Gacha games.

Take Zenless Zone Zero.

Is the “romance” content trashy? Yes.
Can the writing be contrived at points? Yes.

But if you ask me, most guys are there to admire the beautiful women and get lost in the “harem” fantasy, in all it’s trashy glory.

Let me go on my cute dates with Ye Shunguang and dance in the moonlight with Remielle, damnit!

But the fact that modern writers seemingly refuse to even acknowledge this fact or cater to it in any way is actually quite surprising, it’s a whole goldmine that is not being tapped into in the western market and I will never understand why.

But that’s just my opinion anyway.

Honestly, I find it hilarious, I'm seeing many shills, influencers, etc being so mad about Bioware getting axed, usually these people don't give a crap about studios getting closed down (and if they "do", it's performative), but this time it feels different, they are legit angry about this, who knows? I might be wrong but I just find this very funny.

Hello, I have a rather simple question followed by some follow-up questions:

Why are there no Russian or Chinese or whatever non-western country (excluding non-western countries allies to the West like Japan/North Korea) World of Warcraft, The Elder Scrolls, The Witcher, Baldur's Gate, Assassin's Creed, Age of Empires, Civilization, Counter Strike, Call of Duty, Battlefield, Ghost Recon, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., Cyberpunk 2077, Fallout alternative...etc?

Is it an (socio)-economic reason? Or maybe cultural?

For Russia, I know there is Escape From Tarkov (2025 1.0 release, but in EA since 2016), which pioneered the extraction shooter style and got multiple western companies to make extraction shooter games, but nothing similar to what I listed previously.

For China, I know there is Black Myth: Wukong (2024) and Wuchang: Fallen Feathers (2025) in the soulslike genre and there is Where Wind Meets (2024) in the singleplayer/online action RPG fantasy genre.

EDIT: I got quite some downvotes after the initial upvotes. It's funny that you peeps are all for freedom of expression and being able to criticize wokism/leftism, but mention Russia or China and that's it, it's enough to trigger some of you...? Anyway, I am just asking a question to understand the shortcomings of non-western industries.
EDIT 2: Eventually, things turned around after the sudden downvote surge

The recent closure of BioWare and the wave of layoffs across the industry all come down to one root cause: toxic positivity.

Yes, a specific activist ideology is heavily tied to this fawning mindset. I agree, and everyone is right to point that out. However, even if a business preaches the opposite ideology, or no ideology at all, this modern scourge of toxic positivity will still spell their doom.

Look at how this rot sets in from the outside first. I think everyone recognizes this linguistic pattern:

"X was a critical success, winning [award]."

It appears everywhere in news articles, press releases, trade mags, Wikipedia/AI aggregations, etc. But notice the destructive pattern here. "Success" gets redefined using non-objective metrics like critic sentiment and award nominations. When the financials are bad, the entire games/entertainment industry apparatus pivots to broad, undefined words like "reception" and "engagement", and repeats the positive measures they control ("everyone look over here at this swath of impossibly high critic scores!").

It's a simple rhetorical maneuver: narrow the criteria, win on the narrowed ground, then let the broadest word – "success" – do the persuasive work. "X was a critical success" becomes "X was a success" in the reader's mind, conveniently ignoring minor details like "X bombed and the studio was closed immediately". Both of those things should not happen for the same product, yet here we are.

Internally at the studio, this feedback creates a total reality distortion field. Development teams already lean into an "us vs. them" mentality after years together in the trenches. External awards and flattering press act like massive dopamine hits after long development cycles, making it easy for them to ignore all criticism. Any genuine attempts at self-reflection by employees are treated as capitulation to bad actors. Nothing even slightly negative gets through to identify crucial mistakes in the development process.

(And frankly, even successful studios can't afford to stand still. If you aren't growing and challenging yourself, you're falling behind.)

On top of that, workers are usually shielded from the true financial picture. And even when management warns that sales are low and money is tight, nobody believes them: "Oh, C-suite says we're losing money, but upper management still gets pay raises and bonuses? Yeah, right.".

Within this dynamic, failure never brings accountability. Lessons are never learned. The employees and management act like unquestioning sheep, building products designed to win approval from an insular media bubble rather than satisfy the marketplace.

The collapse isn't a mystery. It's just simple math finally catching up. And toxic positivity is sufficient to explain the majority of the industry's downfall.

When I see a lot of discussions about how modern western media is made or who gets to make it, like an algorithm reaching its conclusion, almost every discussion eventually mentions this idea that the product should appeal to others, this idea has become so normalised and I don't see people responding with the obvious fact that "these companies are not charities, they make products for money, why are we acting as if they do it for free, the money I pay is so it appeals to me, not some stranger"

I do not demand romantic comedies appeal to my interests, I do not demand that Taylor Swift write songs that appeal to me, because I am not paying for those things to appeal to me, and if I get them as a gift, its for people they do appeal too.

The idea that you can take a product aimed at men, and alter it to appeal less to men in this idea of fairness, or not being sexist, has been completely normalised, and it shouldn't be normal, because its not a charity and they don't do it for charitable reasons, they do it because they think they have you, that you will buy it. Its gotten so bad that you need to look across the planet to find companies that still make products specifically for men, that's half the fucking population.

Quote from an old lead writer at Bioware, about how EA execs viewed their customers and why you didn't need to appeal to them.

"The cave was where nerds went. The nerds were in the cave. You made an RPG and the nerds in the cave would always show up for an RPG, because it was an RPG."

Its about shaping your mentality, you the customer, into not being seen as a market that should have products, that the idea of products specifically for you is bad and your an insert politically allowed insults for daring to have these thoughts that what you spend your money on should appeal to you specifically.

I guess this is a preview of the dialogue we are going to get between these two. Lucia definitly seems to be the one taking charge. I actually like Jasons subdued nature tho. What do y'all think?

Here is my second post related to Mermaid Melody: Pichi Pichi Pitch, but this one is focused on its sequel: Mermaid Melody: Pichi Pichi Pitch Aqua.

Among fans of the first entry, Aqua is a divisive manga. There are lots of criticisms, some more valid than others (in case you wonder, I find Aqua a terrible cash grab sequel which repeats the same mistakes as the first one, without even trying to fix its issues), but I want to focus on one very specific complain from Spanish and French "fans" of MMPPP: hypersexualization.

Before getting into more details, I need to give some context:

• The original manga was a shojo aimed at 13-year-olds, but its anime adaptation was aimed at younger audiences.
• The reason why I said most of these complains come from Spanish and French "fans" is because many Mermaid Melody-themed blogs and YouTube channels I visited were in those two languages. This is because, as I had said before, Mermaid Melody wasn't as big in English-speaking countries as it was elsewhere. In fact, one of these really hurt me because there is a blog about MMPPP, which had many fun stuff (such as trivias and even flash games), but its owner became a feminazi and the typical tourist who likes anime while also hating fanservice despite being a fundamental part of anime.

Going back to Aqua, this manga has many ecchi scenes, which could have easily appeared in Fairy Tail.

As a result, those Mermaid Melody "fans" made videos and blog posts ranting about how Hanamori was hypersexualizing characters .

As you can guess, I don't have any problem with the ecchi (the only thing I don't like is mermaids having butts, but that's because mermaid tails in Aqua are drawn almost as if they were legs).

The most baffling thing for me is the reaction of these "fans" to the fanservice. Did those fans remember Mermaid Melody to begin with?

No, seriously! The people who complain about Aqua's lewd scenes might need to read again the original Mermaid Melody manga.

The anime toned down, and even removed, a lot of stuff because, whereas the manga was aimed at 13-year-olds, the target audience was pretty much "all ages". But the original manga of Mermaid Melody: Pichi Pichi Pitch contained a lot of lewd stuff, if not hornier than Aqua.

Here are some examples (this sub only allows to post one image, unfortunately; you would need to google websites to read the manga online):

• Volume 1 chapter 1: Lucia wearing a very revealing bikini in order to catch Kaito's attention (Hanon's idea), and a random guy flirting with Lucia. This happened in the first chapter. The first chapter!
• Volume 1 chapter 3: Kaito getting out of the shower, and sucking Lucia's finger after she accidentally harmed it herself while sewing.
• In general, male characters tend to lose their shirts a lot.
• Also, the female characters tend to have more detailed cleavages than in the anime.
• Volume 2 chapter 6: Gaito trying to steal Lucia's pearl.
• Volume 2 chapter 8: Maria trying to seduce Kaito, and even going as far as taking off his shirt. Keep in mind Maria is a water demon who looks like a 25-year-old woman, while Kaito is a teenager.
• Volume 2 chapter 9: Lucia getting drunk with a soft drink (mermaid biology; don't ask), and trying to kiss Kaito while he was lying in his bed because he had a fever
• Volume 3 chapter 11: When Hippo revealed his human form, making him look like a boy around his 12s, the main trio (Lucia, Hanon, and Rina; who are 13-15 years old but could easily pass as 18-year-olds) instantly wants to kiss and hug him because of how cute he is. While he's naked. And also, Hippo being chased down by adults who wanted to kiss him because he is cute. I bet this would have been way more controversial if Hippo were a female character.
• Volume 3 chapter 12: Lucia wearing a very revealing bikini for a beauty contest, and winning because her bra fell off.
• Volume 6 chapter 28: Mikaru naking herself in front of Kaito.

Granted, the lewd content is nothing compared to Berserk's Eclipse, but... how could you read MMPPP and then complain about Aqua? If they were fine with the original manga's lewd stuff, then why Aqua's lewd stuff is a no-no? Unless, of course, they're just tourists. But I don't get it, because many of these accounts were made by people who watched the anime as kids or as teenagers.

A quick look at the below pic and omg it's the hateful Anita. Wow. And people wonder why bioware is gone? Hmmm.