Lords of the Fallen 2 makes a desperate plea for relevance with horny armor

The studio behind the dark fantasy RPG say its female armor designs were made with fan feedback

It's hard to stand out in such a competitive video game market, but the people behind the action RPG Lords of the Fallen 2 are trying their best. The developers at Hexworks revealed the latest designs for the game's female armor on social media on Monday, which it claims to have produced with fan feedback in mind. The studio is evidently so proud of these designs, which it calls "provocative," that it unveiled them via a 20-minute behind-the-scenes video.

Provocative is one word for it. Here's another: generic. If I saw the artwork out of context, I'd probably assume they were the product of a vague AI prompt for a female character in a dark fantasy. Perhaps this outcome was unavoidable: on the whole, the game doesn't have a unique aesthetic.

The armor sets were shown off via influencer TheBackgroundNPC in a YouTube video titled, "We need more devs like this." In it, TheBackgroundNPC makes the argument that Western video game developers are by and large failing to meet the desires of their audiences. To defend this point, she listed a handful of recent shooters that have been released to a lukewarm reception. She didn't argue that said games had poor character designs, which would be the relevant comparison — she merely suggests that the market for such games has become saturated. And while that may be true, Lords of the Fallen 2 is also not in the same genre as any of games she lists.

The video is sponsored, which explains the positive spin. TheBackgroundNPC relays a design process where Lords of the Fallen 2 artists reworked character designs in real time, in response to both fan suggestions and her own. "They are a studio that refuses to be lectured or gas lit into making a different game than the one they have set out to make," she says in a video where she also talks about the studio's willingness to alter its work based on outsider opinions.

Later in the video, TheBackgroundNPC lists off a number of perceived issues with Western character design that Lords of the Fallen 2 supposedly overcomes.

"The same desaturated color palettes, the overly tactical outfits, the stripped-down feminity, almost like an embarrassment to the female body itself," she says. "Hips and busts get slimmed down, shoulders and jawlines get bulked up, and anything that reads as too feminine gets dialed back."

It's possible she's making a reference to games like Overwatch, which recently made headlines after redesigning a female character whose in-game model did not match the design players were shown prior to her release. In that instance, the character's cheeks and jaw were widened ... but these changes were also done specifically in response to fan criticism. The topic is a recurring one, however, as evidenced by the discourse surrounding Abby's muscular character design in The Last of Us 2.

Based on the comments in the video, plenty of people are welcoming the narrative that Lords of the Fallen 2 is doing something special here. To the game's credit, regardless of the truth, the rollout is good marketing for a game that has otherwise struggled to command mainstream attention.

"Who would have thought that devs who give players what they want are much more liked," reads one of the top-voted YouTube comments.

Despite my critical tone, things like this are a matter of taste. If the armor sets resemble something an AI image generator might produce, it's because those products collate the most popular aesthetics to do so. Appeasing the masses is a surefire way to prevent a product from standing out. Lords of the Fallen 2 might be giving (some) people what they want, and that's effective messaging. But in a world where Marvel Rivals routinely ups the horny ante and Steam is overflowing with outrageous sex games, it's a stretch to call any of LotF 2's cookie-cutter female designs provocative.